Heartless
by UsernameNotFoundPleaseTryAgain
Summary: Who says that Takashi Shirogane and the Holt family were the only humans to witness the horrors of life on a Galra prison ship? This is the story of another refugee's redemption; but will Jude's memories hinder abilities to help team Voltron save the universe? Rated T for some language and violence, pairings are a work in progress
1. Chapter 1

"Yeah, I'll be back in a couple of days; three at most if the weather holds up," she said into the phone. The cell was balanced between her ear and her shoulder as she handled the steering wheel of the old pickup truck.

"I don't know, Jude. I don't think that you should go on a trip that long by yourself," another voice crackled through the speaker. "Especially when you're going somewhere as creepy as a mountain in the middle of the desert."

"Don't worry, Nina. I've done stuff like this before. This mountain has tons of old caves and trails, I've planned out the entire trip. I've got plenty of water and rations, so there's really nothing to be worried about." Jude tried to reassure her friend over the phone, but she wasn't quite convinced.

"Have you got extra batteries for your flashlight?"

"Plenty."

"Do you have warm clothes?"

"Why am I going to need warm clothes in the desert?"

"IT GETS COLD AT NIGHT, STUPID! TURN YA ASS AROUND RIGHT NO-"

An obnoxious snort ripped from her nose, "I'm just kidding. I've got another four layers of clothes in my pack."

"Don't mess with me like that!" Her friend whined.

"Don't make it so easy for me, then!,"She laughed. "Seriously Nina, stop worrying. This has been on my bucket list for so long, I'm prepared for anything to happen."

"Dude, you're driving to the epitome of ancient indian burial grounds and abandoned ghost towns; that's some real Bermuda triangle shit that you're walking into. And aren't you going to be right next to that nerd school that the government runs; y'know where they train kids to pee in zero gravity or whatever? What if they're talking to aliens or something?!"

"Nina, please. Are you even hearing yourself right now? I'm just gonna do some rock climbing; so I'm not gonna walk into an ancient burial ground or an abandoned ghost town."

"Okay, but what if the space nerds kidnap you and offer you up to the aliens?"

"Nina, honey, sweetie, mijita, mamita; I'm pretty positive that the "space nerds" are in an astronaut training program. Like, they're prepping to go to Kerberos in a few months. And they're a good forty or so miles away from where I'm camping. So I'm not going to wake up angry ghosts or get offered up to aliens."

"Where the hell even is kerberos? isn't that the dog with three heads?"

"That's a Cerberus, but I'm pretty sure that Kerberos is the moon that orbits Pluto."

"Nerd."

"Shut up, I just like to watch the news in the mornings. It's been all over the papers too," Jude scoffed. "I'm just a well informed citizen."

"Dude, your well informed ass is gonna wind up on Dateline NBC if you aren't careful."

"Nina, would you relax? I know what I'm doing." She turned the rusty truck onto an old dirt road and the tires screeched. "Okay, my service is about to get real spotty. If you don't get a call from me by Wednesday, you should assume that I've been abducted by aliens."

"Don't even joke about that," she said seriously. "And your service is only sketchy because you're still using that jank-ass flip phone; get an upgrade already, and then you can quit carrying your iPod everywhere you go."

"Hey, my flip phone is reliable as hell. And I don't want to download my entire music library onto a different device, it'll take weeks." The line became patchy is she went further down the desolate road."Nina, seriously, I'm gonna lose you. I'll call you in a couple of days. Take care."

"Be careful out there, Jude."

One and a Half Years Later

A body was aimlessly flung against a wall, crumpling on the floor.

"When will you realize that escape is futile," an inhumane voice growled. "You have nowhere to go, nothing to look forward to. It's only a matter of time before the rest of your pathetic planet meets the same fate as you."

Jude lay motionless on the ground, not responding to the Galra guard. He crossed the room, each step pounding on the floor like a hammer as he approached her. One boot connected heavily with her chest, causing her to yelp in pain when the bone snapped. "If all the creatures on Earth are as pathetic as you, we'll have no problem colonizing."

He scraped her from the cold, metal floor by her hair before proceeding to taunt her in the most degrading way possible. "Look at you, you humans are so fragile. All I have to do is apply the slightest bit of pressure," He says, scraping a long claw down her cheek, " and I can puncture that pretty soft skin of yours." A trail of blood dripped down the side of her face. He lazily dropped her to ground once more. Jude fell with a thud.

"All I have to do,"He says with a lewd grin," is use the smallest amount of force." His large boot rolled one of her legs under his heel excruciatingly slow. "And then your bones make that delicious crunch." Not a second later, a horrifying crack echoed throughout the cell, followed by her blood-curdling shriek. The purple feline looked entirely too satisfied with his work, his yellow eyes savoring her writhing agony.

"I suppose that you can't escape if you can't walk. Just for good measure, I think a few days in solitary lockdown are in order." His boots hammered away as he left the cell and shut the large metal door. The auto lock made an audible click, a sound Jude knew she wouldn't hear again for days. She was left alone, in the dark and in excruciating pain, fading in and out of consciousness.

Time began to pass agonizingly slow. That was the thing about space, unless you were on a rock orbiting the sun, there was no way to keep track of the time. The situation was even more disorienting in the solitary confinement unit where there was no light whatsoever. There were four steel walls that amplified most noises outside of the steel door. Half of the time, the only sound from beyond the door was the marching of the sentries or the occasional Galran soldier barking orders. Jude touched the imprint of her iPod sticking out from the leg of her uniform, a habit that she's developed after being taken to space. It was the only earthly possession she had managed to hide after her capture, and it used to make being stuck in SCU easier, but it had long since run out of charge. Now it was just a reminder of the happy life she used to lead on Earth; it was by no means perfect, but she missed it dearly. At this point there was not much to do but sleep and hope that the sentries might let her out tomorrow.

When Jude woke up, she heard the booming of voices echoing throughout her cell. Panic rushed through her body at the thought that the guard would come back, only to be melted away by voices that were obviously not Galra.

"Pidge, can you hack the locks on the doors?" A deep voice called out.

"Yeah, just give me a sec," a higher voice replied. "Wait, okay, now!"

The door to the cell clicked open, bathing the room in artificial light. A thunderous herd of footsteps ran away from the prison deck, no doubt towards a hangar full of escape pods. _This is it. This is my chance!_ Jude dragged her body across the floor, desperately trying to reach the door.

"Hunk and Lance, make sure that everyone gets back to the pods safely. Pidge, I need you to lead them back to the castle."The deep voice ordered. "Keith and I will make sure that everyone got out of the ship."

Heavy boots ran in all directions, but there was a flicker of hope when they approached the solitary confinement unit. Jude's voice hadn't been used in weeks, but somehow she still formed the words.

"Over here! Help!" Her voice squeaked, but the strangers still managed to hear. They're pace quickened as they approached the cell, but the sound was blocked out by all of the blood pumping through her ears. Jude's heart nearly leapt to her throat when two figures darkened her doorway; one in read armor and another in black. Their faces were enveloped in the shadows of their helmets, making the expressions of the rescuers unreadable. For the longest minute of her life, they stood there just staring at her.

Tears blurred her vision at the realization that they might not help her, panic seized her chest at the thought that she might not leave this terrible place. "Please," she wheezed. "Please help me." She continued to crawl towards the door even though her left leg was completely useless. Red hot embers seared through her torso as Jude clawed her way towards the door, contorting her face in pure misery. Only then, did her potential rescuers snap out of their trance.

"We're here to help," the taller one said. "Are you alright? Can you walk?" She nodded no, feeling exhausted just by the thought of dragging herself to the escape pods.

"Shiro, we have to carry her to a lion, all of the pods are gone," the boy in red said. "You grab one of her arms, and I've got the other. The man in black nodded in agreement, and then they lifted her off the ground. Pain ripped through her side, resulting in a strained groan on Jude's part, but she had never been happier in her life. Jude tried to stay awake as they barreled down the hall, she really did; but it became increasingly difficult to keep her eyes open. She began to go limp as they carried her past empty cells and broken sentries.

"You're doing great," the taller one said. "Just try to stay awake; we're almost there." Jude's eyes felt droopy, but she did her best to listen to the man in black armor. He continued to talk, just so she'd have something to focus on. "I'm Shiro, and this is Keith. We're paladins from Voltron, and we're trying to free prisoners from Zarkon's control. Do you think you have any sort of internal injuries?"

"They broke my leg, and maybe a rib. I'm gonna make it though," Jude croaked. Hot tears pricked her eyes as the neared the hanger, only partially because of the pain she was experiencing, but mostly because she was finally free.

"What's your name," Keith asked. Though he never actually looked at her, instead, he just focused on getting out of the ship as soon as possible.

"Jude Jimenez," she yelped through gritted teeth. Her ribs protested with every step they took, but there was enough adrenaline in Jude's system to keep her conscious.

"Okay Jude, how long have you been on this ship?" Shiro asked. They approached the hanger, and her eyes bulged at the sight of their ships. There were two monstrous lions with open mouths waiting for them, one red and another black.

"Oh uh, I'm not sure," her voice quivered. "Maybe a year, maybe longer? I've lost track of the days." Jude stared at the ships in awe. In what world was this a normal ordeal? Who in the hell gets kidnapped by aliens and needs to be rescued by spacemen in flying LION ROBOTS? _Oh my god, Nina was actually right? That paranoid conspiracy theory junkie called it; I got kidnapped by purple aliens and my face probably got put on a milk carton. Do they still do that for missing kids? Do people even buy cartons of milk?_ Jude snapped back to reality at the sound of her rescuers' voice.

"Alright, we're going to take you somewhere safe." Jude's head spun as she began to digest the weight of the situation; she might actually get to go home and suddenly her tears stopped dead in their tracks. Shiro dragged her aboard the black lion, still calling out commands to his fellow paladin. "Meet us back at the castle. Help the others get the prisoners into the healing pods, but keep one open for her."

"No, there is probably someone else who needs it more," she shouted. "There are a lot of elderly people who need medical attention, not to mention all the people that got forced into hard labor or gladiator fights. They are the main priority here, I'm going to be fine."

"You're covered in blood," Keith shouted back. It was true, Jude's face was crystallized black from her last encounter with the Galran guards in addition to the scars that ran down her arms and chest, most of which were hidden by her prison rags. However, she didn't back down at the dawning realization that she was in pretty bad shape too.

"This is an old flesh wound, it already sealed up."She pointed at her face. "There are a lot of people worse off than me, please hurry!"

Keith nodded and ran into his ship. Mere seconds after the door clicked shut the engine roared to life. Not in the metaphorical sense but quite literally, it ROARED before taking off.

"C'mon, let's go," Shiro said wearily. He guided her gently into the gaping mouth of the lion, steadying her as she hobbled aboard on her good leg. When they entered the cockpit, Jude noted that it was a somewhat cramped compared to the rest of the ship. "The fit is going to be a little tight, but I can still steer if we share the seat." He sat down and helped her lie across his lap, careful not to bump her broken leg. "Is it going to be too painful for you to sit this way?"

"I'm fine, let's just get out of here," she shivered. The pilot flipped number of switches and pushed a series of odds and ends on a massive touchpad before the engine hummed to life. It was plain to see when they broke away from the prison vessel and a sense of relief washed over Jude as the ship became less and less visible in the distance. A much more inviting refuge came into view, a white castle. It was sleek and modeled more like a rocket than the gleaming ivory towers that children read about in storybooks, but it was a castle nonetheless.

As the ship approached a hanger, Jude couldn't help but notice how Shiro stared at her with such unease. His inky black eyebrows were furled in anguish as he examined her. _I must look like a wreck. Everyone's seen those old war documentaries where someone frees an enemy prison camp, but the prisoners are just barely alive. I haven't looked at myself in a mirror since they captured me; the poor guy must be terrified._

"Um, sir," she said hoarsely. "I- I look a lot worse than I actually feel. honest to God, I'm way more concerned about the other prisoners. I'm gonna be fine."

"Yeah," he said absentmindedly landing the lion in the hanger. "We're still going to get you checked out when we go inside though." The lion hummed as it shut itself off. The black paladin gingerly looped Jude's arm around his neck, causing her to wince when his armor made contact with her rib. "Sorry, sorry," he said, panicked.

"I'm fine," Jude groaned. "Let's just make sure the others are okay." Ever so slowly, they made their way out of the lion and approached the castle. Shiro walked her into what Jude could only assume was the control room; it looked so similar to the one on the prison only differences were the fact that the room wasn't bathed in an eerie purple light, and a Galra wasn't working the controls. But then again, she had only ever seen a few glimpses of it through the confines of an air duct. Regardless, the sight left Jude trembling, causing her to take a tighter grip on Shiro's armor.

Six other people were waiting patiently for the man in black. Needless to say, they were more or less shocked to see this girl dangling from his arm. They all exchanged bewildered glances, afraid to address the elephant in the room. Well, all except for one.

The paladin in blue was the first to pipe up. "God, what happened to you?"

"Lance," the red paladin hissed. "Would it kill you to be a little more considerate? We just pulled her out of of a Galra prison hold." Keith's face was visible now that he wasn't wearing a helmet. He was obviously asian, his complexion was dead giveaway. He was definitely an aggressive presence, but it didn't seem to faze the wiry latino guy one bit. Keith crossed his arms over his chest and shot daggers at the boy in blue, but he didn't back down.

"Yeah, but the other guys are aliens," he threw up his arms emphatically. "She's obviously from our planet, so when did a Galra ship invade Earth and start to kidnap people? What if they've enslaved the Earth since we've left?!"

"Lance!" a female voice barked. "You know that I've been keeping tabs on your planet; Earth is not a priority for Zarkon now!" Lance only backed off when the ebony-skinned woman told him to do so; she was obviously the leader. She had an authoritative air to her, what with all of her alabaster locks tied into a tight bun and how everyone in the room seemed to gravitate towards her naturally. Jude made a mental note not to make her mad. "We need to turn our attention to the young lady's injuries, it's apparent that the Galra have done quite a number on her."

"But Princess," the man with the mustache interrupted."All of the cryopods are occupied." _Wow, I didn't know that they had Australians in space. I guess Nigel Thornberry got sick of exploring the African safari._

"I'm fine," Jude chimed in, hoping to ease some tension. "I just need a splint and then I'll be good as new."

"You see,"Space Nigel Thornberry explained," Alteans didn't have much use for medical supplies during the times of old, so we don't necessarily have a "splint" just lying around."

"Coran, we can just use something makeshift. What have we got?" A husky guy in a headband asked. He stood tall, hovering over everyone in the group but Shiro. However, intimidation did not seem like a trait that came naturally to the boy in yellow armor. His disposition seemed too warm and friendly.

"I bet I can find something in the lab. What do you need," another person chimed in. This kid made intent eye contact, willing to help Jude in any way possible.

"Two rods about 'ye big," Jude gestured the approximate length of her leg to the paladin in green. "And duct tape! Wait, is there duct tape in space?"

"I'll see what what I've got, but you should try to get some rest, uh," she looked at her blankly. "What's your name again?"

"Oh, I'm Jude," she winced. Pain had a tight grip on her body; Jude almost regretted turning down the healing pod. She knew it was the right thing to do, so there was no use in complaining about the situation. Everyone in the room, however, could clearly see the anguish wash over her tired features.

"I will take our guest to go get cleaned up," the princess said as she crossed the room. "Meanwhile, the rest of you should be using this time productively. We will break for dinner in an hour."

Shiro, still propping Jude against his shoulder, voiced his agreement."You heard Allura, hit the training deck."

Allura looked intently into Jude's golden honey eyes, almost scared to approach her too forcefully. "I can only imagine that you'd want to change out of that prison uniform." Jude nodded silently, eager to burn the rags that she'd donned for more than a year. "Alright then, Shiro, will you help me bring her to my quarters."

"Yes," he said, eyeing Jude warily. "Of course." Allura proceeded to wrap Jude's free arm around her neck, and guided her out of the room.

This time, they were more careful with the girl; walking throughout the castle slowly as not to disturb any of her injuries. As they meandered in and out of hallways, the paladins would stop whatever they were doing and look at Jude sorrowfully. They passed by the lab, and Pidge stopped digging through boxes of old gears and other unfamiliar objects long enough to wave at them half heartedly. When they turned at the kitchen, Jude caught a glimpse of Hunk and Coran whispering to each other as their eyes darted from her and back to whatever they were preparing for lunch. Needless to say, they weren't very discreet. Lance lounged on a couch across the way and he eyeballed the trio apprehensively, uncaring of whether or not Jude noticed. Walking past the training room was the most painful interaction by far. Keith was sparing with what could only be described as robot with roid rage; when they passed by, he lost focus and left his defenses wide open. The robot sent him flying with the cleanest uppercut that Jude had ever seen. The simulator promptly shut off and the princess made it a point to rush her away from the training deck. Everyone was acting like they had seen a ghost. But it wasn't just passerbies in the hall, it was also Allura and Shiro. They would look at her like the pop-eyed puppies on those celebrity endorsed animal shelter commercials, glance back at each other, and then continue to give Jude the worst pitying gaze. It was almost too much to take.

"Um, guys," Jude chimed in. Her voice snapped them out of their daze. "I'm not dying or anything. Sure, space prison is no joke; but I'm going to be okay." Jude did her best to cheer them up, even though it should've been the other way around, but they still looked worried. "I do a lot of bouldering and rock climbing, so I've fallen off small mountains before. Seriously, if a thirty foot fall onto sheet rock doesn't kill me, nothing will."

Shiro chuckled softly, although it didn't seem like he was quite processing what Jude was saying. Allura was a little more apt to engage in conversation though. "Oh really? You'll have to tell me more about that." However, the group stopped in front of a large door and Allura told the black paladin," Thank you, Shiro. I believe that I can take care of things from here."

"Are you sure that you don't need anything else?" Although, his eyes desperately pleaded for her to say 'no' when he removed the former prisoner from his shoulder.

"Perhaps you can bring the things that Jude requested whenever Pidge finds them?" The princess didn't get the hint. She couldn't be bothered to read social cues when she was taking care of someone that desperately needed help.

"I'll try to be back soon, in that case," he answered casually. However, his body language was anything but relaxed. Shiro's shoulders were stiff and he wasn't really focusing on anything in particular. Or rather, he was trying not to stare at Jude. He practically ran out of the corridor when Allura gave him the okay to leave.

Allura turned to face the girl, who was surprisingly calm given the circumstances. "Perhaps a bath is in order?"

Jude's face lit up at the word "bath". How long had it been since the last time she had a real bath? The guards only ever sprayed prisoners with a power hose whenever they deemed fit, and even then those times were rare and few.

"Please, I would appreciate that more than you know," she beamed.

"Of course, let's go." Allura led her into a lavish bedroom fit for a king, or a princess in this case. Floor to ceiling tapestries covered the walls, and a massive round bed was covered by a transparent canopy. On the opposite side of the room, there was a vanity. For the first time in months, Jude finally saw her own reflection and it was somewhat terrifying.

Her tan skin was blanketed in a thin mixture of sweat, dirt and whatever other grime that had stuck onto her during the course of her imprisonment. Her once short hair, the mass of black ringlets that she could never successfully grow past her shoulders, was now a knotted rats nest that fell to the middle of her back. An unsightly clump of dried blood ran along the top of Jude's cheekbone, just beneath her eye, threatening to leave a nasty scar. Her lips were chapped red; the bottom one had split open, leaving an ugly strip of dried blood behind. The only evidence that that she was still Jude Jimenez, were her eyes. They still looked like honey, they still looked determined to take on whatever the universe decided to throw at her. Nobody could ever deny that.

"Wow, this is a pretty good hair day for me," Jude chuckled. "Truth be told, I didn't look much better before they abducted me."

Allura smiled harrowingly at the small human. Even though Jude was getting by on her humor, the princess's heart went out to her.

"Come on," she smiled. "The spring is right over there." _Spring?_ Allura led the grubby human to a door within the room, and when she opened it Jude's jaw hit the floor.

A waterfall, with an undetermined source flowed into a pool that appeared to be made of a substance very similar to rose quartz. It was easily the size of an actual hot spring and probably just as deep. Steam rose from the surface of the water, which was swirling with unfamiliar flower petals.

"Holy crud," Jude uttered. "This is amazing! How does something this big fit into a room this size? Where does the water come from?" Jude looked around the room in awe, threatening to give herself whiplash.

Allura laughed," We had many highly skilled architects on Altea. Only the best of them worked on this castle."

"Just, wow," Jude gushed.

"Alright, I assume that you'll need assistance," Allura said, rather confidently.

"Oh, I hadn't thought that far ahead." Even under all of the dirt, it was fairly obvious that the tips of her ears were turning bright red. "I guess I do." A lump formed in her throat, and the princess took notice.

"Jude," she said softly. "There's no need to feel embarrassed. My people view the body as a more of a shell for the soul to safely reside in. We don't read too much into body-image hype like the people on earth do."

"I just want to warn you that I have a few scars," Jude said, avoiding eye contact. "The druids didn't mess around, so just… Don't panic."

"I can handle it," Allura said confidently. Jude nodded, letting the princess know that it was okay to proceed. They carefully peeled away the body suit that was the staple of a Galra prisoner. The princess was sure to be especially careful with Jude's ribs, trying to make the ordeal as painless as possible. Once the uniform made it to her ankles, a silver rectangle clacked to the floor. Allura bent over to pick it up, looking thoroughly confused. "What is this."

"Oh that's my iPod."

"Your what?" Allura turned it over in her hands a few times.

"You use it to listen to music and play games. I have a ton of pictures saved too. It just hasn't been charged in a really long time, but I was able to hide it before the Galra threw away all of my things. It's more of a keepsake from home now."

"Fascinating. I'll keep this dry for you, in that case." Allura tucked it away into a pocket in her dress before continuing to help Jude into the spring.

It was a slow and painful process, but Jude managed to sit on a stoop near the edge of the pool. Warm water came up to her neck, and the bathing process would've been a godly experience had Allura not been brushing knots out of Jude's hair with the force of a lawnmower. "Princess, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but could you AHHHAHAH-" Jude couldn't finish her sentence when a monster knot got ripped out of her hair.

"Hush, I'm almost done," then she proceeded to yank out three at once. "Try to finish washing up, I'm sure that Shiro will be back any moment with your splint."

Since the princess couldn't be bothered with her whining, she decided to make small talk. "So, your highness," Jude started.

"It's alright if you just want to call me Allura, titles aren't too important out here," she said as she yanked out another section of matted hair. Jude did her best not to shriek.

"Allura, what's your planet like?"

She stayed quiet for a moment, but decided to answer the question anyway. "Altea was the most beautiful place; it was a land of fantastic beasts and mighty mountains. My father was a fair ruler, and all of his subjects admired him greatly. We were a peaceful people that thrived in diplomacy and exploration, which is why we were in such great standing with our allies until Zarkon…" Allura clenched the brush in her hand and relaxed just as quickly. "Zarkon destroyed everything, Coran and I are the only Alteans who have survived this ten thousand year war. He's destroying planets, Jude, and wiping anyone that doesn't surrender to his power."

Jude's breath hitched in her throat. "Does that mean...is the Earth going to be destroyed too?" Her chest began to tighten, but Allura rested a hand on her shoulder.

"I won't let that happen. That's why we have the paladins and Voltron! We're slowly taking back planets and freeing innocent people from the rule of the Galra empire. Eventually we'll be able to fight Zarkon head on and then we'll destroy the empire at its source." She enthusiastically ripped out more tangles from Jude's hair, causing her to actually yelp this time. "Oh sorry, I'll try to be gentler. Why don't you tell me more about your planet?"

"Well, I also live near the mountains," she said as she scrubbed another layer of dirt from her skin.

"Oh, yes. Didn't you say something about climbing on rocks?"

"Yeah! So what you do is, you strap yourself into a harness with a lot of ropes and clips, and then you scale a rock wall and secure clips into the mountain every now and then. Then when you reach the top you can lower yourself down safely."

"And then what?" Allura probably didn't mean to sound unimpressed, her question stemmed from genuine curiosity.

"Well, you don't really do anything else after that. Rock climbing is more about pushing yourself to new limits and becoming stronger. It's really invigorating, there's nothing more satisfying that reaching the top and taking in the view."

"How interesting," Allura exclaimed as she began to attack the last of the knots. But she stopped dead in her tracks at a new discovery. "Jude, I didn't know that humans came with pictures on their skin!"

"Wait, what?" Jude looked down and realized what Allura was talking about. _Damn, I was so dirty that I forgot about all the ink I had underneath it all._ "We don't," she giggled. "These are tattoos." Jude lifted her arm out of the water so that the princess could take a better look.

"What?" Allura seemed thoroughly confused.

"You mean that you've never seen tattoos before?"

"I've never seen anything like them! How do you get your skin like that?!"

"Well, you have to find someone you trust and then they dip a bunch of needles in ink and sort of...weld a picture into your skin. And then it's there forever."

"But you have so many!" It was true, Jude had three quarters of a sleeve running down one arm, a chest piece that ran into the sleeve, a wrist tattoo on the opposite arm, a piece that took up both of her shoulders, and a piece on the outside of her thigh. "My uncle owns a tattoo shop, so he did most of these for me. I actually work there after school and on the weekends."

"How strange," she mused. She yanked one last knot from her hair with a great deal of finesse, and quickly plaited it into a long, loose braid. "Well, I think we're done here. Are you ready to get out?"

"I think so."

Allura grabbed a towel from a nearby rack, ready for Jude. The princess practically lifted her out of the water before helping her back to the bedroom. She sat on the edge of the massive bed, shivering at the change temperature after the door to the spring was shut.

"Let me see if I have anything that will fit you." Allura flung open the doors of a very impressive wardrobe, and a multitude of brightly colored cloths burst out.

"I don't know, Allura. I'm not all that tall-" It was true, the alien woman practically built like an amazon warrior. She was easily eight inches taller than the little latino girl, if not taller.

"Oh nonsense, something is bound to fit you," she said cheerfully. She may or may not have been excited at the prospect of dressing this girl up. Heaven knows she tried with Pidge, but that ended VERY badly. She jumped at the chance to pick something out that was pink and drowning in ruffles. "How about this?"

"Um, that's nice, but maybe we could try something more loose? Something that won't rub up against my ribs and legs too much? I don't need anything fancy." Jude tried to be polite, but couldn't fight a cringe at the sight of a garment that closely resembled a circus tent.

"That's fair," Allura sighed. "Is there anything that jumps out at you?

"What about that?" she pointed to something grey that had fallen to the bottom of the closet.

The princess picked it up. "This is a sack that I keep ribbons in."

"Oh." The tips of her ears turned pink with embarrassment. "What about the one in the corner?" A little sliver of white fabric peeked through the piles of clothes. Allura pulled out a white dress with short sleeves and beading in the front.

"It's so plain," she gasped. "Are you sure?"

"It looks comfortable though," Jude smiled. "It looks like it'll keep off my leg."

Allura tossed it across the room and it landed on the bed next to Jude. The material felt silky to the touch, and she lovingly admired the beading before she slipped it over her head. It was in this instance that Allura saw one long, pink scar in the middle of Jude's chest and several smaller ones littering her legs and torso. She decided against commenting on those.

"It actually does look very nice," Allura smiled. "You look like a completely different person now!" Jude looked at her reflection in the mirror once more, and the results of the bath were astonishing. She looked like her normal self, but older. Now that the knots were combed out, her hair was even longer than before, resting at the small of her back in a beautiful braid. Her lips were no longer inflamed, and the scar on her cheek was barely noticeable. In fact, her skin was practically glowing, It must have been something in the water.

"Thank you for helping me, I don't know how to repay you," Jude bowed her head humbly.

Before the princess could reply, there was a knock at the door. "That must be Shiro," she smiled. But when she opened the door, all five paladins and her advisor were there. "Hello, everyone. I assume that you all wanted to check on your fellow human?"

Lance practically lept into the room, examining the transformation that took place in the span of the past hour. "What happened to _you_?"

"Um," Jude was slightly taken aback. "I think we established that I was on a prison ship?" _Wasn't this guy looking at me like I grew an extra head an hour ago?_

"Yeah, but now you're a lot easier on the eyes, sweetheart," he said with what he thought was a charming grin. He proceeded to sit next to her on the bed and throw out another line. "I'm Lance, kind of like the knight from the round table."

Jude was horrified to say the least, but she could handle this guy. She put on her sweetest smile and pretended to take the bait.

"I'm Jude," she smiled and stroked his arm. "And I will not hesitate to break a round table with your face." Then she twisted it behind his back and pushed him off the bed in one fluid motion.

The team did their best to stifle laughter, but Keith outright said,"Ooh, I like her."

"Thank god _someone_ finally twisted his arm, I'm just a little disappointed that it wasn't me," another voice chimed in. Pidge pushed to the front with a rig that looked a lot fancier than two rods and a roll of duct tape. "I made a splint, it should hold up until another cryopod opens up."

"Great job, Pidge," the princess beamed proudly. "Come in. Let's see if it fits." She pushed up her glasses and approached the stranger as confidently as she could.

"Hi," she said, holding up the splint. It didn't look much like a splint at all, it was more like a couple of thin rods bent together and smoothed out to look like a piece of foreign space jewelry that would reach from her knee to her ankle."This material is super light, and I know that it doesn't look like it's padded, but there's a good chance you'll be able to walk on that broken leg."

"That's amazing," Jude breathed. "Thank you so much." Pidge smiled at Jude as she helped her slide into the splint. The black material curved around the outside of her leg, practically cradling the broken bone. "Fits like a glove."

"Do you want to try walking?" Jude nodded and rose from her seat. She really was able to put weight on the injured leg, kind of like an air-cast. Only, this thing was a couple of strips of foreign space metal welded together. She didn't even need straps to adjust the fit, the device was that perfect.

Jude wobbled across the room a couple of times until she got used to the feel of the contraption; she began walking normally after three laps. Pidge looked quite pleased with herself, to say the least; and the team looked a little relieved to see that the girl wasn't in too much pain.

Coran clapped his hands together to get everyone's attention,"Well, dinner is ready. You all should come to the kitchen, we've got quite a spread set up."

"Sounds great," Shiro said. Everyone shuffled into the hall eagerly. Jude made it a point to stay behind the group in order to avoid seven pairs of eyeballs being glued to her back. But the paladins still glanced over their shoulders at her. She cleared her throat and their heads snapped forward when they realized that they were probably making her uncomfortable.

Jude let her eyes roam around as they walked down the halls. The tall ceilings were held up by long pointed arches made of a smooth white material. The walkways and doors were lined with soft blue lights that strained the eyes less than the purple glow of a Galra ship. The group passed one window that led from the floor to the ceiling, causing Jude to stop in her tracks. Beyond the pane of glass were millions of stars and glowing strips of galaxies. Jude had spent many summer nights at the tops of mountains, gazing at clear, unfiltered night skies; but nothing looked familiar. She couldn't find a single constellation she knew, and the halo that cloaked Venus or any other planet was nowhere to be found.

Shiro had noticed when she broke off from the group and decided to approach the girl, against his better judgement. Jude never even noticed him standing right next to her. How could she notice anything but the sinking sensation of how far away she was from home?

The black paladin broke her from her hysteria-induced trance by putting a large hand on her shoulder. She barely registered it.

"Jude, you doing okay?" He asked tentatively, even though she obviously wasn't.

"We're a long way from Earth, aren't we?" She continued to stare blankly at the the glass.

"Yes," he sighed.

"Am I actually going home, or?" Jude couldn't finish the question; she turned to look at the face of the sorrowful paladin and knew the answer. Worry-lines crept to the edges of his dark eyes as he ran a hand through his greying hair. He didn't have to say anything for Jude to know that the chances of going back to Earth right now were slim to none.

"I'm sorry," was all he could manage to say. "If we go back now, the Galra will follow us. This time they might actually enslave the planet or worse. I know how badly you want to go home, believe me; but we can't risk putting the Earth in danger. We can't go back now."

Jude sucked a shallow breath into her tightening chest and did her best to stay calm. Her knees felt like jelly and the color drained from her face. She clawed onto the window for balance, pushing Shiro's hands away when he tried to help keep her steady. "I'm okay!" She snapped at him. He took the hint and backed away. "So, if Zarkon falls from power, everyone will be safe?"

"Yes. But the empire spans across the entire universe, it's not going to fall over night." Shiro looked at her solemnly, but she appreciated his honesty. She finally got a good look at the fifth member of Voltron and knew that he had also been taken by the galra. The scar across his face, the cyborg prosthetic, and the tired look in his eyes gave him away.

"They got you too," she whispered. "How long did it take for you to escape?"

"It was almost a year before I managed to get out," he recollected. "I'm just disappointed that I couldn't manage to save my old crew after our mission to Kerberos went south."

"Wait, you were on the Kerberos mission? They took me months before that even happened," Jude gasped. Shiro's eyes widened at the realization that this girl, with no connection to the Garrison or any kind of pilot training, had done more time in an alien prison than him.

"What do you mean?"

"The six month countdown to your launch was still a newspaper headline when I got taken. I just bought a car, so I decided to go on a road trip and do some climbing. There's a canyon on the state line that has a lot of trails and climbing spots-"

"You didn't." Shiro's voice went down an octave.

"My friend warned me that there were a lot of weird old ruins in that area, but I thought that I would be miles away from anything strange," Jude said, shivering when she dug up memories that she had shoved deep down inside of her. "So when it started raining, I had to wait out the storm in a cave with all sorts of pictographs carved into the walls. I thought I was alone, but it turns out that the galra were looking for something. I tried to run, but.." she trailed off. "I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"I'm so sorry. I know what it was like to be imprisoned by them, it's hard to bounce back after being held hostage for so long. The important thing is that you're safe now." He definitely seemed like a leader, knowing just the right thing to say and when to say it. Jude really didn't mean to step on his sentiment.

"No, the important thing is that we take down the Galra," she said almost nobly.

Shiro raised an eyebrow at her sudden determination," We?"

"I don't know anything about going to war against an empire or flying a giant lion into the infinite abyss of space, but I want to help. I don't want anyone else to be a victim of Zarkon's tyranny, especially the people that I left behind on Earth. There has to be _something_ I can do! Just please, let me help." She looked at the paladin with pleading eyes and he smiled.

Shiro stretched out his Galra arm to the girl; she shook his hand without hesitation.

"Welcome to the team."


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey guys, thank you for your awesome reviews! Sorry it took a little while to get this chapter uploaded, but I had to revise it a little so it wouldn't sound like garbage. I just wanted to let you know that KeithxJude is probably going to be the main pairing in this story. Sorry if the ed gets a little cliffhanger-y but it's one am and I'm very tired. Please enjoy!**

-Dinner was a little bit uncomfortable, to say the least. The table was full of indiscernible foods in varying color and...aroma. It was a little overwhelming to try and pick something, especially when Jude couldn't remember the last time she had a meal that wasn't Galra table scraps. When she finally settled on a substance that sort of resembled soup, the team was probing her with questions whenever there wasn't a sporkful of food in Jude's mouth.

"So, how old are you," Pidge asked, playing with the gelatinous mass on her plate.

"Seventeen, I think? Maybe a little closer to eighteen? I sort of lost track of time."

"Did you go to the Garrison," Hunk asked. "I don't think we ever saw you." He swallowed something that looked like shrimp, except it was blue, and he looked expectantly at Jude all the while.

"I just went to regular, public high school. I've never actually seen the Garrison up close, but the students were always hanging around local hot spots."

"Then how did you get mixed up with the Galra," Keith said. He hadn't really touched anything on his plate. The shock of finding another human this far away from Earth curbed his appetite.

"Honestly? I think I got abducted on a fluke. I was hiking when the Galra had touched down on Earth, and I guess they couldn't have anyone running to the Garrison and ratting them out. They kept going on about this blue lion, but they gave up on looking for it after a couple of days." Everyone at the table looked around at each other, then back at their plates.

"Well, we have it now," Allura chimed in. "It's one of the ships that form Voltron, similar to the lion Shiro brought you back in."

"Not for nothing, but why does Zarkon want this thing so badly?" Jude took a bite of something that looked like a vegetable, but the consistency squished down her throat in the most horrifying way.

"It's the only weapon we have that can destroy Zarkon. If he gets it, the universe will ultimately fall to his control," Allura replied. "So we're liberating individual planets until we're strong enough to take the fight to him directly."

"Do you have many allies, or is it just your team fighting the Galra?" Jude looked around the table, hoping the fate of the known free universe wasn't resting on the backs of a handful of teenagers.

"We're in alliance with a few liberated planets, but they are mostly small and non malevolent. We do most of our recon by ourselves," Shiro answered. Jude nodded, not quite sure how to respond to all of the new information that she received. The safety of the universe was banking on five kids and their flying robot warships. The gravity of the situation began to set in. The table went silent as they waited for her to ask another question or break down in hysterics, but she showed no sign of spiraling into any sort of psychotic fit.

"I think I need something alcoholic," she mused.

"Alcohol is more of an Earth thing," Coran said animatedly," Alteans never really discovered the concept of intoxication."

"You mean to tell me that you people made gigantic fighting lions but you never managed to ferment a freaking grape? That's wild." Jude rubbed her temples and thought over her next question carefully. "I need you guys to be one hundred percent honest with me. What are our chances of actually beating Zarkon?"

Everyone glanced at each other with confident little grins.

"We can do it, no doubt about," Lance said confidently. "Try to be optimistic, all that worrying will give you grey hair. Just look at Shiro!"

"Yeah, have a little faith, man." Hunk slurped down a sporkful of noodles, or something that resembled noodles. "You just haven't seen us in action yet; Voltron is like super strong. We've taken down entire fleets of Galra ships without an issue."

"Alright guys, cut her some slack. It's natural for Jude to have some reservations about the situation, especially after everything she's gone through. It's been a long day and we can try to catch her up on all of the details later," Shiro said. "It might be a good idea for everyone to get some rest so we can regroup in the morning and figure out our next course of action."

"Yeah, but I've got one last question?" Lance chimed in.

"Um okay," Jude said cautiously. "Shoot."

"How can you be only seventeen and have _that many_ tattoos?" The table groaned collectively, but not before Keith and Shiro smacked the back of his head. "Hey!" He shouted. "This is a serious question! Do you know how many old school hispanic parents would keel over if their kids got tattoos? I know for a fact that my mother would disown me!"

"Guys, it's cool," Jude reassured. "My uncle actually runs a tattoo shop and I work there with a couple of my cousins. And it's kind of an unspoken rule that you've gotta have some ink if you want to get any clients."

"What kind of logic is that?" Keith said confusedly.

"Well, you don't go to a sick doctor if you need a vaccination. You don't let a colorblind guy mix your paint at the hardware store, and you most certainly do not get a tattoo from an artist that is squeaky clean. People just don't trust them, typically."

"I guess that makes sense," Pidge agreed."And don't let Lance get to you. The real reason he won't get any tattoos is because he's got a really low threshold for pain; the whole mamma's boy spiel is just a cover up." The group chuckled heartily as embarrassment left a trail of red across the blue paladins' cheeks and ears.

"I don't have to take this," he muttered. Lance angrily swiped his plate from the table before marching it to the sink. "Pidge, it's your turn to do dishes tonight." He let a sly smile show, for the universe was about to bite the young cadet on the butt. It served her right. Who did she think she was, embarrassing him in front of this attractive, if not totally uninterested, stranger?

"Aww, what? I thought it was Keith's turn," she whined.

"No, I did it yesterday," Keith huffed.

"I can do them," Jude volunteered.

"Jude, that's very thoughtful, but wouldn't you rather get some rest?" The princess looked concerned. She and the paladins wouldn't be gracious hosts if they put her to work right off the bat, after all.

"No, really," she replied. "I want to. It's the least I can do after you guys saved me and the other prisoners." Before anyone could protest, she went around the table and began picking up plates. A broken bone knocked angrily in her chest with each movement, but she worked through it and tried to appear casual. "And I was wondering; how long will it be until they're well enough to be up and around?"

"They'll come out of cryosleep in a day or two," Coran answered. "In the meantime, you shouldn't push yourself too hard." He raised a bushy eyebrow as she continued to clear the table against his advice. The animated alien cleared his throat. "You wouldn't want to overdo it after the day you've had, what with your injuries and all."

"I appreciate the concern, Coran. But I don't think washing a few plates will kill me," Jude hummed. Her bare feet padded towards the sink as the table began to disassemble.

"I guess I'll head back to the lab, then," Pidge said. "Thanks, Jude." The bespectacled helmet head waved before she disappeared from the dining hall. One by one, everyone else left the table to get ready for bed. Coran, however, wasn't just going to stand by and let the Earthling do the Paladins chores when she was in such a condition.

Although Coran's heart was in the right place, his timing wasn't the best. He only snuck up behind the Earthling when she was contently scrubbing away traces of food from a large platter. She practically jumped out of her skin when he rested a hand on her shoulder, dropping the plate with a heavy _CLANK_.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you," he said apologetically.

"Oh, it's fine," Jude reassured him. She smiled nervously, trying to cover up any of her initial fear. Jude refused let on that any of the day's events had gotten to her. "What's up, Coran?"

He whipped out a rag from a nearby cupboard and tried to be stearn. "It wouldn't be right to let you do _all_ of this work by yourself. I thought I'd help you dry everything off."

"Thanks," she said quietly. They scrubbed in silence for a few minutes. Coran wasn't sure about how he could approach the girl in a way that didn't overstep his boundaries. His heart went out to her, it really did. He could only imagine what she was going through. He would die on the spot if Allura had been in the same situation; how was Jude's family coping with her disappearance?

"You alright?" Jude asked. The poor guy looked incredibly tense, he'd been side-eying her for almost five minutes.

"Yep," he said a little too enthusiastically. "I just got a little lost in thought is all."

"I guess that it's been a long day for everyone, I can finish the rest of these if you wanna go to bed."

"Shouldn't I be telling that to you?" Coran looked at the child inquisitively. "There's an extra room two doors down from the princess's quarters; you should go get some rest."

"I'm just not very tired," she said. "It's just taking me a little while de-escalate, is all." Jude scrubbed the last dish and the man with the moustache took it eagerly.

"I've got just the thing for restless sleepers," he said enthusiastically. He wiped off the plate before practically sprinting to a nearby cupboard and rummaging through it's contents. "We found a wonderful herbal tea on a planet populated by nomadic whitefeng herders. They say that it's supposed to calm down busy brains," he said as scanned several jars.

"No kidding," She said, rather impressed. She hopped onto the newly cleaned counter, waiting to see what Coran could possibly be looking for. "I bet that you guys get to see all sorts of planets and cultures."

"We try to learn as much as we can about the people we're protecting. Diplomacy is a big part of team Voltron's job," Coran replied, before snagging a jar off of the shelf he was looking at. "Here's the little sneak! Why don't I get started on that tea?"

In the meantime, the princess had wandered off to the lab in hopes that she might find Pidge. And just like always, the young paladin was sprawled across the floor, busy typing away on her laptop. Needless to say, she was surprised to see the princess standing in the doorway, she almost never came to the lab.

"Hey, Allura. Is something wrong?"

"Not at all, I just wanted to come and check on you," she said warmly.

"Oh, why," Pidge queried. The princess sauntered across the room and plopped down on the ground next to the green paladin.

"Well," Allura started. "I know that it hasn't been easy to free so many prisoners and not find your family; and I thought that finding another human would hit a little too close to home."

It was true. Pidge had been looking tirelessly for her father and brother for what felt like forever. Everyone on the team was understanding of what she was going through and did their best to help, but she knew that defeating Zarkon was the main priority now.

"Thanks. I'm actually doing okay, though. I'm more worried about Jude than anything."

"How do you mean?" The princess was confused; Pidge had already done a perfectly nice thing by making a splint for this girl who was obviously doing fine now. She was safe in the Castle of lions.

"I don't know," the young cadet readjusted her glasses. "It's just that she was in there even longer that _Shiro_. It doesn't look like they replaced anything with Galra prosthetics, but they had to have done something horrible to her." The memory of the long scar splitting down Jude's chest flashed across Allura's memory, and she quickly shook it out.

"Don't worry, Coran will be able to see if anything is wrong after we get her into the pod. We'll figure out the rest from there."

"Yeah, but still, I wish we could do something nice for her." Allura's face lit up at that comment.

"Maybe we can," she smiled. She reached into the pocket of her gown and pulled out the silver thing that she had been holding for the past two hours. "Jude said that this was the last possession that she could manage to save from Earth."

Pidge took the ipod from her and looked it over carefully before giving the diagnosis.

"It's still in pretty good shape, I think it just ran out of juice," she said. "I've actually got my old charger." The green paladin practically jumped to her desk and began rummaging through drawers until she found a little white cord.

Before long, she had hooked it up to her laptop and the white apple symbol started glowing on the screen.

"So, does that mean it's working?" Allura was hovering unnaturally close to the strange piece of technology, absolutely intrigued. She was even more amused when the screen changed to a picture of three small children holding a calico cat. Pidge slid her finger across the smooth surface and a few apps popped up.

"Wow, she doesn't have much," she said. And then she clicked on the Music icon. "That explains it, she's almost got a thousand songs stored on this thing.

"Oh my, there are a thousand songs stored in _this_?" the princess had met billions of people across the universe, but none of them had managed to come up with such a novel idea.

Pidge continued to scroll through playlists, just to see if Jude had anything worth listening to. And boy was this girl's taste all over the place!

"She's got some Elton John, Snow Patrol, Bill Withers, All American Rejects, Yo Yo Ma, Black Sabbath, Pearl Jam, Carlos Santana, Stevie Wonder, Led Zeppelin, Selena Y Los Dinos? And the entire Fantasia soundtrack is on here too? At least her taste is… diverse?"

"Pidge, I literally did not understand a word you just said." The princess was thoroughly confused. Who was Bill, and why was he withering? She did even want to _know_ how one extracted jam from a pearl.

"Uh, it's not important," Pidge said. "We should just give it back to her when it's done charging."

"Wow, Coran. This is really...something." Jude stared at the suspicious pink liquid swirling around in the mug.

"Go ahead, give it a try," he said with a twist of the moustache. "

She took a quick swig and the liquid began to warm her stomach. It tasted like cinnamon and peaches and honey, which was an oddly satisfying palette of flavors. Heat began to tickle her nose and cheeks as relaxation set in, but there was no real effect taking place of Jude's lack of exhaustion.

"This tastes great," she said. "Could you top me off before I go to bed?" She held her cup out to the strange man and he eagerly refilled it with his odd little kettle.

"Alright, try to get some sleep now. We want you to be well-rested so you don't have to spend too much time in the pod tomorrow."

"Will do," she hummed in agreement. "I'll see you in the morning."

"Goodnight," he said cheerfully. He watched her walk away from the canteen with a twinge of guilt building up in his stomach. This strange girl was definitely hardened by her time with the galra; scanning her surroundings every so often, and hobbling on her broken leg. But she was still only a child, drowning in a dress that was at least two sizes too big, which dragged across the floor wherever she went. Although she was behaving in a way that wouldn't otherwise indicate it, she must have been terrified. Who wouldn't be at least a little scared after being kidnapped by the most dangerous species in the universe, only to be rescued and find out that she couldn't go home?

Jude wandered to the empty room that Coran had mentioned before, and peered in cautiously. It was a pretty average run-of-the-mill bedroom with a full sized bed bolted to the wall, a bedside table and a decent sized closet. However, there were no windows, just the glow of a few LED lights in the ceiling.

The bed gave a dry squeak when she sat down. She tentatively sipped her tea, hoping that some form of sleepiness would set in.

Before long, the every last drop of tea had been drunk, but to no avail. Jude had no idea how much time had passed, but it was probably a little late now. A shiver passed through her due to the absence of a warm object in her hands. Not a moment after she wrapped a blanket around her shoulders, there was a sharp knock on the door.

"It's open," Jude called out. The door slid open, and a little gremlin proceeded to enter. "Hey, Pidge. What's up?"

"Um, Allura gave me this." She held out the iPod and Jude's eyes widened when she suddenly remembered that the princess had been holding onto it this evening.

"It still works," she gasped. She couldn't control herself, her excitement just exploded. She practically leapt out of bed and gave the green paladin the biggest hug she could muster, completely ignoring the pang in her ribs. "Thank you, thank you, thank you so much! I'm going to return the favor someday; anything you want, I'll do it!"

The green paladin was completely caught off guard by the sudden embrace, nearly falling over. Regardless of the shock, she still hugged back as naturally as she could. It was funny, only Shiro gave her hugs. Even so, there was still a question tugging in the back of her mind.

"Actually, I was wondering if I could talk to you a little? It's kind of important."

"Sure, come sit." Jude took her arm and led her to the edge of the bed. As badly as she wanted to scroll through comforting photos of home, she managed to restrain herself and slip the iPod into the pocket of her dress. (that was the great thing about Allura's clothes, they all seemed to have pockets!)

The chestnut-haired child looked a little apprehensive, but took the invitation anyway.

"I was wondering...did you ever see other humans while you were in the prison?" She looked at Jude with pleading brown eyes, praying that she would say what she was dying to hear. Pidge knew that it was probably too early to drag any information out of this stranger, but every minute she wasted looking for her family was another minute they would spend suffering in the clutches of Zarkon.

"I don't think so, why?" Jude suddenly remembered the conversation he had with Shiro before dinner. Didn't he say something about not being able to save his crew?

"It's just that my dad and brother also got kidnapped, and I've been trying to find them for a long time. I know that the Galra are holding them in a prison, but I just don't know where." Pidge's heart sank to her stomach. Another dead end. Another disappointment. It was starting to feel like she was taking two steps backward for every step she took forward. She began to question whether or not she could ever find her family.

"Pidge, I'm so sorry. I didn't kno-"

"It's okay," she sniffed. "You couldn't have." The young girl took off her glasses and cleaned them with her shirt, holding back tears. They sat there awkwardly for a moment. Jude didn't want to overstep her boundaries by trying to give this girl the pep-talk of the century; they'd only met a couple of hours ago. But when she saw the defeated look in her eyes, she knew that she had to say _something._

"I know that it must be hard on you," Jude gave her hand a little squeeze. "But they are going to be okay. I mean, look at me. I don't know anything about space or tactics, hell I barely passed entry level astronomy with a C+, but I'm still alive and well. There's a really good chance that they got sent to a work camp if they haven't already busted out of prison and formed an alliance with some other refugees."

"Has that ever happened before?" Hope glimmered in her watery eyes. Maybe they were fine after all?

"People get sent to do work in the mines every so often, as long as they're somewhat healthy. I can't make any guarantees that they've broken out and started a resistance, because I've only heard rumors about that kind of stuff; but it's not beyond the realm of possibility. Just look at Shiro. He was able to escape, right?"

"I guess you're right." Pidge dabbed her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt, and let Jude continue. Everyone on the team had always been supportive in the search for her family, but they had never brought up the possibility that they might actually be okay.

"I really believe that they're gonna make it. They've still got each other," Jude said reassuringly.

"But what if they got separated?"

"I don't know about that, the Galra had a system to keep track of all of the inmates. Everyone was grouped off by species, gender and location in the galaxy, so they probably had to keep all of the humans in the same place. I never saw them because I got sent to a ship where they kept the overflow inmates, but there's a good chance that they're still together."

Pidge's hands were shaking at all of this new information. She had been translating Galra gibberish for months without any success, and any hope of finding her family became more and more bleak. But now there was a possibility that they were somewhere out there, free from the control of the Galra empire. The tension in her shoulders began to ease, and she felt light as a feather. The bed made a loud squeal as she fell back into Jude's pillow with a laugh.

"There's still a chance," the green paladin sighed with relief. "I can still find them." Her eyelids began to grow heavy as she relished in her newfound comfort. Pidge didn't know if it was due to relief or just the fact that she'd been holed up in the lab for almost two days, but she was exhausted.

"You _will_ find them," Jude smiled. Pidge's eyes slowly closed shut as Jude pulled the blanket off of her shoulders to cover her. When the green paladin's head finally finally settled into the pillows, the girl in white carefully removed her glasses and set them on the table next to the bed.

Jude's splint made a quiet _tak tak tak_ as she tiptoed with care across the floor. There wasn't much point in trying to go to bed now that her room was occupied, so she took her chance to do a little bit of exploring around the castle. She made sure to shut the door as quietly as possible, leaving Pidge to get what was probably a sorely needed night's sleep.

She wandered aimlessly through the dimly-lit halls, not really knowing where to go. Jude assumed that everyone had long since gone to bed, so there was no point in looking to see where they were. Instead she just retraced her steps, hoping to find an area that looked familiar. After a few turns down a wing that may or may not have lead to the common area, she found one section of the castle that she actually remembered. A large pane of glass stretched before her, revealing billions of brilliant shining stars.

The scene was completely mesmerising. Millions of little white lights swarmed around in the infinite sky. Jude huddled close to the window before she slid to the ground with a painful grunt. She really had overworked herself today and an alarming amount of pain began to settle into her bones. It felt like lightning was buzzing around in Jude's ribs and leg, causing her to cover her mouth in order to stifle her whimpering. Her best option was to sit completely still and wait for the stinging in her ribs to subside. This wasn't the worst place to be stuck in, after all.

After what felt like a few minutes, Jude tested her movements and grabbed the trinket in her pocket. When her fingers clasped the cold metal, an excited shiver ran up her spine. Her hand shook when the screen lit up to one of the last pictures she had taken before she wound up in space. Three Jude's cousins were smiling brightly and holding her big calico cat, who was a little less than enthused about the situation.

When she unlocked the screen, her trembling fingers tapped the Music icon. Jude scrolled through seemingly endless playlists until she had found exactly what she was looking for. A playlist named "Sleep Tracks" was a hundred mp3's of piano medleys, calm video game chiptunes, and white noises like thunderstorms and waterfalls. This playlist was better left on shuffle, it was mostly background noise anyway.

Again, agonizing pain pooled in her torso. The device fell to the ground with a clatter when she mindlessly clawed at her side. Her injury hadn't been nearly this tender a few hours ago, but then again, she had kept herself moving almost the entire day. Jude had managed to make everyone believe that she was doing just fine, hell, she convinced _herself_ that she was doing just fine; but it was becoming more and more evident that she wasn't. The throbbing in her chest felt like it was spreading throughout her entire body like venom; hot, and agonizing, and sluggishly so.

 _This is fine. I just have to wait it out. I'm going to be fine. I'm going to be fine. I'm going to be fine._ 'I'm going to be fine', she told herself these words like a mantra. Jude thought she could just will away the waves of affliction, but as time went on it was apparent that she could not. She pressed her forehead against the freezing window and drew in a ragged breath.

 _Snap out of it, Jude. Just focus on the pretty lights._ However, black spots began to cloud her vision as the stars outside began to swarm and disperse. Her head slumped forward as she began to struggle to keep herself upright, clumsily using her arms to prop herself up. Everything felt heavy, and the castle's artificial gravity was slowly dragging Jude down. Even her eyelids were threatening to close shut. _No. Don't go to sleep. You know what will happen. Stay awake._

But pretty soon Jude couldn't even hear her own thoughts. The only discernable sound was the blood pumping in her ears and the vague chord progression of a piano somewhere far away. Exhaustion began to set in and her arms promptly collapsed under her, causing her to fall onto the unforgiving floor. When she rested her cheek on the sleek metal surface, it was over. Everything went black, and the room disappeared.

 _Suddenly Jude was back on the prison ship, strapped to a table in the medical bay. Hands from all directions were either holding her down or breaking her sensitive flesh with needles. She tried to move her head, her arms, her legs, anything; but it felt like she was submerged in a vat of molasses. However, what she could see, were the maniacal yellowed smiles of several druids, hiding behind hooded cloaks._

 _Jude's voice left her mouth oh so slowly, but she was still able to utter,"Please. Let me go. I want to go home."_

 _They all ignored her or just couldn't hear her, either way, they showed no intent of stopping anytime soon. Instead, one of the hooded figures pulled out a tool from the confines of their robe. A small knife glowed in a familiar purple hue._

" _Please," Jude screeched. "Not again!"_

 _But to no avail. The druid scraped the blade down her chest with one agonizingly slow motion, paying no attention to the sound of Jude's screaming or the sizzling of her skin. Her head writhed in throes, giving her the glimpse of something yellow glowing and pulsating behind her bones._

" _No!"_

The hammering in her chest continued to knock against the broken bones, and a pair of hands were still holding her down. Except, these hands weren't keeping her wriggling shoulders pinned down like the others. In fact, they were shaking Jude feverishly.

"Hey," a far off voice said. "Wake up, it's just a dream."

Jude's eyes fluttered open, barely registering her surroundings. Instead it felt like there was a strobe light going off in her brain, skewing her perspective in the most terrifying way. Although she wasn't aware of it, the girl was hyperventilating and simultaneously trying to squirm away from whomever it was that was trying to wake her up.

The pair of arms were suddenly wrapped around her shaking frame, smothering any of her movements. Slowly she began to give in to the imposing force and stopped struggling, tiring herself out enough to slow down her breathing a little.

"That's, right," he said. "Just breathe."

Her breath came out in ragged little puffs, but it was significantly better than what she had been doing before. Her vision began to stabilize and then she remembered that she _wasn't_ in prison and that the druids couldn't get her here when she looked out the window. She could hear the quiet interlude of a piano coming from the iPod that she had dropped before passing out, but she wasn't really registering where it was coming from. Jude's heartbeat began to slow back down to a normal pace, although she couldn't stop shaking.

"Hey, are you doing okay now?"

She slowly turned her head to see who was holding her, and a recognizable dark head of hair came into view. His arms were still wrapped tightly around her, squeezing the nightmare out of her. If the circumstances had been different, Jude would be beet red right about now, but she was totally unfazed by how close she was to the strange boy. Sure, he was attractive in an 80's renegade Speed Racer reject kind of way, but Jude was too frazzled to give the situation much thought.

"Keith? What happened?" The girl clutched her head and did her best to get a grip.

"It looked like your were having a spasm attack or something, you really freaked me out for a second," he said not too calmly. He slowly helped her sit up and kept speaking softly, but somewhat sternly. "Why were you sleeping in the hall?"

"I was just walking around the castle and I sat here for awhile. I guess I must've fallen asleep,"Jude lied. "What're you doing out here?"

"It's still pretty early, but a few of us are up. Coran and Allura went to go check on you, but Pidge was in your bed?" The events of last night slowly came back to her.

"Oh, we were talking for a little bit and she kind of fell asleep," Jude explained. "I wasn't going to bed any time soon, so I didn't see the point in waking her up."

"Well, I think that's the most sleep she's gotten since she was a toddler," he huffed. "But still, there's probably another ten spare bedrooms in the castle. You could've gone to one of those, or the couch in the common area at least."

"I guess that I'm just used to sleeping on the floor," she shrugged. The red paladin immediately shut his mouth and silently reminded himself not to be too harsh with her. He didn't know what the Galra had done to Jude, and he couldn't begin to imagine what she may have seen.

"Well, the healing pods are going to open up in a couple of hours," he mumbled. "Let's get you something to eat in the meantime."

Jude nodded solemnly, and she let the boy help her off the ground. A familiar, dull pain crept back into her bones but her face showed no sign of it. _I'll be damned if I make any of them worry about me_ , she thought to herself.

"And maybe Coran can make you something warm to drink."

Keith was wrought with concern. The only person in the castle that fell asleep in weird places was Pidge, but she never had spells like Jude. Every now and then Shiro would have an attack, but those were different. He'd be paralyzed by his flashbacks, but Keith knew how to handle those.

He'd never seen anyone look so terrified. Jude was curled up in a ball and convulsing when he found her. It was obvious that she was having a nightmare, but Keith had never seen anyone _whimper_ in their sleep. Even when he managed to calm her down, she couldn't stop shaking. Rings of dark flesh pooled beneath her eyes, which were unwilling to meet his.

Instead, they walked to the kitchen in silence. Jude kept her eyes to the ground, almost ashamed of herself. She was angry that Keith had seen her this. She was supposed to be good as new and ready to kick some Galra ass, but memories of the past year were resurfacing.

The last thing Jude wanted was for the others to find out that she was having issues coping. If Keith announced that she had an episode, they'd probably treat her like a China doll: easy to break. If Jude wanted Keith to keep his mouth shut, now was the time to speak up. She cleared her throat, and the red paladin turned his attention to her.

"Look," she said. "I really appreciate that you snapped me out of that nightmare, but could we keep this between us?"

"Not a chance," he retorted.

"Excuse me?" Jude was flabbergasted.

"What if you have another night terror and wind up hurting yourself? It's probably for the best if we just keep an eye on you for awhile."

"I can handle myself, thanks a lot," she huffed.

"Says the girl that was curled up in the fetal position in the middle of the hall," he said sarcastically.

"Hey!" Jude snapped. "I just dozed off a little; it was a very eventful day." She threw up her hands emphatically, but his hardened expression didn't budge. "Come on, it's not like I was frothing at the mouth or anything. Everyone gets nightmares."

"Yeah, well not everyone has been locked up in prison by aliens." He crossed his arms over his chest, indicating that he wouldn't change his mind on the subject. "I think that it's better for everyone to kno-"

"Know what? You don't know anything about me," she barked. "There's no point in making everyone else worry about this one-time thing because I'll _deal_ with it. If everyone thinks that I'm too shell shocked to handle this, they probably won't let me help get rid of Zarkon; now will they?" A familiar knot began to rise in her chest, and Jude did her best to suppress it; but damn it the boy with the mullet was beginning to make her mad.

Keith was steady as a rock, he wasn't going to change his mind so easily.

"Look, I know that I probably have some sort of information about how the Galra forces operate, but it's still fuzzy. It's going to take either a lot of triggering or a lot of invasive tests to figure out whether or not I know anything useful," she gulped. "But if everyone decides that I can't handle being strapped to a table or shoved inside a sensory deprivation tank for a few hours, then you'll probably be losing a valuable resource."

"Jude, we don't even evaluate _Shiro_ like that. We'll figure out a way to get rid of the galra without frying anyone's brain." Keith wasn't going to lie; he was a little impressed with this girl. She was so willing to help the cause in any way that she could, but she was unstable. He was genuinely concerned that she was willing to be a martyr in order to either save the Earth or die trying.

"Well I'm not gonna sit back with a cocktail and do nothing. I have people back home that I need to protect, and I'll be damned if Zarkon so much as lays a finger on them."

"Don't act like you're the only one concerned about the Earth," Keith snapped. "All of us have families that we're worried about."

"Yeah, and you're going to need all of the help that you can get if you want to keep them safe." In the heat of the moment, the knot in her chest unfurled with some strange side-effects. Jude's feet floated off the ground so she was eye-level with the red paladin. "Quit trying to throw me a pity party and just let me help!"

Keith was taken aback. He had seen plenty of weird things in space, and flying robot lions were just the tip of the iceberg. But this phenomenon was a whole different layer on the hypothetical onion of weirdness. People weren't supposed to do that. People weren't supposed to float in the heat of an argument; but there Jude was. The pads of her feet were glowing like a yellow glow-stick, and she was floating.

Keith took a step back and rubbed his eyes, just to make sure that what he was seeing was real. "How the _fuck_ are you doing that," he practically screeched.

Jude hadn't realized what was happening until she saw the bewilderment in his eyes. In that instant, the light engulfing her toes went out abruptly and sent her toppling to the ground with a thud. She groaned as pain shot through her broken bones, practically paralyzing her.

Keith quickly snapped out of his daze and stooped down to help her up, but Jude smacked his hands away as she propped herself up. He repeated himself. "How… what was _that_?"

"It happens sometimes," she said through gritted teeth.

"Yeah but _how?_ " She was acting so casual about this, like it was just some sort of mild inconvenience; which unnerved the boy even more.

"I don't know," she scowled. "The druids didn't exactly give me a play-by-play of what they were doing. I could have laser eyes for all I know."


	3. Chapter 3

Keith was only snapped out of his current state of shock when Hunk came around the corner.

"Hey guys," he yawned. "What are you doing sitting in the middle of the hall?" The pair were still sprawled across the floor. Keith was about to start rambling about what he had just seen the girl do, but Jude cut in before he had the chance.

"I tripped," she replied. "Everything's still a little tender, so it takes me forever to move around. Keith was just offering me a hand up." Jude wrapped a small hand around his larger one and gave him a warning squeeze. He looked at the trembling girl in white, and she pleaded with large doe eyes.

Keith let out an exasperated sigh and went along with it. Everyone else was going to find out soon enough, and it wasn't really his place to tell them about what he had seen. Hell, he wasn't even sure _what_ he saw. Chances were that Coran would be able to come up with a more accurate diagnosis than he ever could, so he decided to humor her.

"Alright," keith heaved. He and Jude slowly rose up to their feet, but not without Jude drawing in a sharp breath. "You okay?"

She nodded and let out a strained," Mm-hmm." Giving him a small thankful grin, they silently made a truce. Slowly releasing his grip, Keith decided that she'd probably want to relish in a normal morning before the voltron crew looked at her like some sort of crazy lab experiment.

"Kay, so I found this lying around in the hall?" Hunk held up an abandoned iPod. "And Keith's too much of a dork to listen to anything that isn't classic rock, so I figure that it's probably yours?" The yellow paladin's voice shook Keith from his thoughts, and also took Jude's attention.

"What," Jude took the trinket from the yellow paladin and thumbed through a few songs. "You mean like this?" Not a second later, the opening riff to "Highway to Hell" blasted through the small speaker, resulting in an eyeroll from Hunk.

"It's too early for this," he grumbled.

"Aw c'mon, who doesn't love ACDC?" Jude laughed. Regardless, she hit pause and slipped it into her pocket. Keith smothered a small smile with a cough. Hunk, of course, didn't notice in his half-asleep state. Otherwise, he would've been prompted to tease the red paladin about how he was failing to be subtle.

"Have either of you guys seen Pidge," he yawned with a stretch. "She wasn't in the lab."

"She actually fell asleep in a real bed for once," Keith shrugged. "The nerd whisperer managed to tear her away from the laptop for a few hours."

"Woah, no kidding? Nice going, Jude." Hunk went to give her a friendly pat on the shoulder, but his hand stopped in midair when she flinched.

Jude felt bad. He seemed like such a friendly guy, but her reaction was completely involuntary. It was a habit that she developed over the course of her time with the Galra.

"Sorry," she apologized. "It's just a reflex."

"No worries," Hunk said gently. "Why don't we just grab some goo from the kitchen?"

"That sounds great," Jude said, trying to focus the conversation on something else. She let the two paladins lead her to the kitchen.

"So, how's the leg holding up," Hunk asked casually, making sure to slow down his pace as they strolled through the castle.

"Pretty solid," Jude replied. "I didn't expect to be able to walk on it so soon. Pidge did an amazing job with the splint."

"Yeah, totally," he agreed. "You should see the upgrades that she's been putting on our lions! The armor on Yellow was super strong before, but now she can take direct fire from some pretty massive ships since Pidge last modified it."

"Jeezus," she said in awe. "I can barely replace a tire on a car."

"Don't feel too bad. Pidge has a freakishly high aptitude for engineering, especially for her age. She made most of the professors at the Garrison look like chumps," he laughed.

"That doesn't surprise me one bit, especially if she's modifying alien battleships."

She was thankful for the small talk. It felt like Jude had only been participating in an interrogation the day before, and whenever she wasn't answering probing questions she was fighting off pitying gazes and assuring everyone that she wasn't as bad off as they thought. This was a nice change of pace.

"What about the rest of you guys," Jude asked. "You _all_ must be pretty talented, considering that you went to the Garrison and everything."

"I was an engineer before the whole Voltron thing," Hunk replied. "Shiro was one of the leading professors on the Kerberos mission, and Lance was my pilot, but Keith was the top pilot in our class."

"That's amazing! Most high schoolers are just biding their time until graduation, but you guys are already so accomplished,"she gushed.

They entered the kitchen, prompting Hunk to get started on breakfast.

He bashfully grabbed three bowls from a nearby cupboard.. "I don't know about that-"

"No seriously," she interrupted. "How many teenagers can say that they kicked ass in a space exploration program? Don't be so modest." She gave the boys a warm smile as she boosted herself onto the sleek, white counter. The girl felt secure in their capable hands, but she began to wonder her how secure she felt about herself.

Although Jude was abducted when she was only sixteen, she was done with highschool. She took a lot of summer courses at the local community college, which allowed her to graduate early. But she still couldn't help but feel a little bit like a fish out of water. She used to think that she was two steps ahead of the game, and that she would be the first person in her family to go to college and graduate with a degree in something important; but these guys were five steps ahead of the game. Not only were they already in a college level academy, but they were also working to save the entire known universe from an empire that was ten-thousand years in the making.

It made her wonder how she would fit it into all of this. Jude didn't know anything about engineering or being a pilot, hell she didn't know anything beyond what she had learned in an entry-level astronomy class. Sure, she told Shiro that she wanted to help with the rebellion; but now that she was giving the idea more thought she didn't know what she could do. There was a possibility that the information she had wouldn't be useful at all. What would happen then? The thought of not being an asset to the team killed her.

" _Hello_ , Earth to Jude," Hunk said.

"What? My bad," Jude said, snapped out of her thoughts.

"Do you want the juice that sorta tastes like oranges and pineapple or the juice that sorta tastes like apples and lemons? Alteans kind of have an acquired taste when it come to flavors."

"Oranges and pineapple sounds good," she said. Hunk tossed something in her direction that looked like an adult-sized Capri Sun, but Jude had a delayed reaction. Sure, she didn't study astrophysics at the Garrison, but she wasn't dumb enough to try and extend her arm too fast and catch it. The pain wouldn't have been worth it.

"What the hell, dude?"

"My range of motion is still kind of limited," she said with a shrug.

"She's still got a broken rib, Hunk," Keith said sternly.

"Oh god, I forgot about that," the yellow paladin said with a firm palm to the face. "You're just moving around so well that it almost seems like you don't have any injuries." The poor boy was genuinely embarrassed as he picked up the juice box, and the daggers that Keith shot at him weren't making the situation any less stressful.

"Guys," she interjected. "It's no big deal. I'll be good as new by the end of the day, right? Coran said that I'll probably be able to get into a healing pod today."

"Yeah, but you should try to take it easy until then," Hunk said. "You don't want to spend more time in there than you have to."

"I guess not," jude agreed.

The yellow paladin proceeded to extract a dollop of green goo from what appeared to be an intergalactic frozen yogurt machine. This time he walked over and made sure to hand her the plate and juice box. Jude thanked him before taking a whiff of the strange gelatinous mass, but it didn't really have a smell.

"I'm not gonna sugarcoat it, the goo takes some getting used to; but it has got all of your major nutrients. It's not so bad once you've had it a couple of times."

"No, it looks great," she replied. Jude gratefully dug a spoon into the substance and took a healthy bite. The consistency was a lot like jello, but it had as much flavor as a boiled potato. She had eaten worse, so she kind of just shrugged and continued to eat. "It's not bad. This is probably the Altean equivalent of oatmeal, right?"

"Basically," Hunk said as he cranked out two more bowls. "You don't necessarily eat it for the flavor as much as the health benefits." He slid a platter across the counter to the red paladin before digging into his own.

"It beats a bowl full of lentils," Jude joked, but not without a shudder.

"Lentils?" He said with a mouth half full of goo.

"Do _not_ get me started on the lentils," she said before shoveling another bite. "My grandma practically made them every day for six years, I have had more lentils than anyone should _ever_ have in their lifetime."

"Yeah, well try eating beans in a can for five months," Keith huffed. Jude paused and looked at the boy in confusion.

"Like just frying up some beans in the morning before class or like cartoon hobos stowing away on a train and eating beans in a can?" She tilted her head, genuinely curious about what he meant.

"More like the second thing you said, I guess."

"But he stole a hoverbike from the engineering department instead of stowing away on a train," Hunk added.

"That wasn't until after I got kicked out of the Garrison,"Keith defended.

"Whoa, whoa, wait," Jude interjected. "Why did you get kicked out of the Garrison?"

Hunk got a smug look on his face before he said," Yeah, Keith. Why _did_ you get kicked out of the Garrison?" Hunk already knew why, but he thought the reason was hilarious nonetheless.

You'd think that Keith would've gotten in a million fights and talked back to the instructors because of his hot-headed nature, but that wasn't necessarily the case.

Embarrassment tinted the skin on his neck as he mumbled something under his breath.

"What was that, buddy? I don't think we quite heard you." Hunk teased him. Had it been anyone else, Keith would have been fuming by now. But over the duration of their time in space, the red paladin grew close enough to Hunk to actually let him joke around like that. However, that didn't make him any less embarrassed.

"I kept bringing stray cats into my dorm," he said slightly louder.

"Yep, the guy with the scary temper has a soft spot for kitties," the yellow paladin grinned.

"Oh, well that's not so bad," Jude said with relief. "It's actually kinda swee-"

"And then I ripped a control panel out of the flight simulator and threw it at a professor."

"O-oh," she choked. Keith had his arms crossed over his chest and didn't really seem bothered by the fact. He, enjoyed getting that kind of reaction out of people. It's not like they expected much else from him anyway.

"I don't blame you," Hunk chimed in. "Professor Iverson was kind of a dick, and everyone knew it." The red paladin nodded back in agreement and continued to eat his breakfast, eyeing their guest suspiciously.

"It's not like I'm the only one who's gotten in trouble at school. Delinquents like us have to stick together, right Jude?"

"Haha yeah," she half-agreed. "But I don't know if sitting on the fire escape during lunch counts as a major act of delinquency. I think I was mildly inconvenient at best."

"Seriously?" Hunk said. "That's the worst trouble you've ever gotten into? Even I've gotten into more trouble than that at school."

Jude's face flushed a noticeable shade of pink before she stuttered. "W-well I got thrown out of a hookah bar once."

"What were you doing in a hookah bar," Keith asked, intrigued.

"I had just graduated so a couple of my cousins snuck me in to celebrate."

"GRADUATED?! I thought you said that you are only seventeen?" Hunk was shocked at this new information.

"I took a lot of supplementary classes at the community college, so I graduated early. And I'm halfway done with my associates degree too," she explained. "But I wound up finishing high school before winter break during my junior year, so I didn't get to walk with my class at graduation. My cousins felt bad so one of them loaned me her ID for the night and the other two took me out to the hookah bar."

"So why'd you get thrown out," keith asked.

"Besides for being underage? I sorta, kinda, accidentally...knocked over an expensive hookah and broke the water jar."

"That sounds like an honest mistake," Hunk sympathized.

"Oh but it gets worse," Jude chuckled. "So after I knocked it over, the charcoal caught the rug on fire and left a really big scorch mark on the floor."

"Yikes." Was all Keith said.

"Haha yeah, I'm kind of banned from there. Forever. But I guess I've got bigger problems now," she said with a small laugh.

The paladins laughed awkwardly with her, surprised that she was cracking jokes so soon. But as long as Jude wasn't curled up in the fetal position or rocking back and forth in a corner it would probably be best for them to just roll with it.

Not a second too soon, Allura entered the kitchen with an exasperated expression.

"Jude, Coran and I have been looking everywhere for you, but When we went into you room, Pidge was sleeping in you bed," the princess almost yelled if she hadn't been trying to catch her breath. However, the wild and exasperated look in her eyes proved to be fairly intimidating anyway.

"I'm sorry for making you guys worry so much," she said as sincerely as possible. "Hunk and Keith have been really nice about showing me around though. Hunk even made breakfast."

Allura wanted to be stern, but Jude looked so content despite being on a strange ship with a strange team. She decided to let this whole wild-goose-chase go.

"Well I'm glad that you're getting acquainted with everyone so far. But we just let the prisoners out of the pods, so we should get you prepped for cryosleep."

"Wait, is it okay if talk to them and make sure they're okay?" Jude hadn't seen anyone since she was sent to the solitary confinement unit, and she feared that they may have suffered in her absence.

"I don't know Jude-"

"Please Allura? I've spent the last year and a half with them; maybe even longer. I just want to see with my own eyes that they're okay, and then I'll do whatever you want." Jude began to plead with big doe eyes. Under normal circumstances Allura would've said no and dragged her down to the pods, but seeing the prisoners seemed really important to her.

"Just a short visit, but then you need to get ready for the pod. We still don't know how many other injuries you might have sustained."

"I understand," Jude said with a nod. "Please take me to them?"

Allura smiled and took Jude's hand before saying," They're doing much better now, and I'm sure that they'll be happy to see you."

She quietly led the trio to the wing where the newly-freed prisoners were resting. Jude's face lit up like a Christmas tree when she saw that her comrades were safe. She practically sprinted towards the group on her broken leg and gave as many hugs as she could muster, making sure to greet everyone she saw.

"Neera, are you feeling okay?...

Quadralene, nothing hurts anymore, does it?..

Kada, are you sure that you don't need to go back in there?.."

Hunk and Keith watched in slight horror as an older female prisoner grabbed both of Jude's hands with one set of arms and cradled her face with another set of arms.

"Child you are not well. Please let these people take care of you," she begged. The old woman was hunched over from age, so she was just at Jude's eye-level. However, it was obvious that she had a strong influence on Jude. The poor girl looked so guilty for making her Gran worry.

"I'm fine Gran, I just wanted to make sure that everyone got what they need." She stood up a little straighter and talked a little more enthusiastically, so the old woman would know that she was going to be okay.

"You silly thing, the Galra hurt you the most out of any one of us. You had been gone for days. We thought they killed you."

"It'll take a lot more than a broken bone to get rid of me," Jude assured her.

"It should've been you healing in the chamber, child. You were probably much worse off than any of us." The old woman was shaking with fear for the poor girl. She knew what had gone on behind closed doors and feared that Jude might be damaged beyond repair.

"It's okay, Gran. All that matters is that all of us are safe. I just wanted to make sure that you didn't need anything before they fix me too."

"We are all fine. Just please go to sleep and these kind people might be able to mend your bones." Then she pushed her toward the pod room with all four arms."Go, go, go!"

"I'm going Gran! I'll try not to sleep too long," Jude laughed.

Allura began," Alright, everyone is safe. Jude, it's time to go."

The girl reluctantly broke away from the aging alien, but not without giving one of her hands a confident squeeze. She turned to everyone in the room and gave them a big smile.

"I'll see you all soon. Please get some rest." Her smile slowly faded as Allura led her into the hall.

On their way out, Allura said to the paladins," Please make sure that our guests get something to eat. Jude will be in the pod for quite awhile, so you'll have time to check her progress later."

"Sure thing, princess," Hunk said. "Just give us a call on the intercom if you need us."

The prisoners were all whispering among themselves, eyeing the door where Jude disappeared uneasily. A little girl had tears streaming down her face from her multiple spider like eyes as she watched the princess take her away.

Hunk bent down to the sniveling child and spoke to her in the most assuring voice he could muster.

"Hey, she's going to be just fine. The princess and Coran will have her fixed up in no time."

"But what if they cook her too long and she explodes?!" The girl practically shrieked. "The Druids blew her up so many times, I don't know if she'll make it this time!"

"What do you mean they blew her up," Hunk asked in terrified confusion.

The elder alien stepped in and hushed the girl.

"We appreciate the kindness that you have shown us, Warriors. But it is not our place to tell you what the Druids have done to the Earth child."

"Why can't you tell us," Keith said sharply, although the woman was unfazed by his tone.

"The child has protected us from the hands of the Druids and violent Soldiers alike. We owe it to her to respect her privacy. She may want to tell you what she's seen in her own time; but until that time comes, our lips will be sealed."

The red Paladin raised an inky black brow at the strange four-armed woman, but he didn't push the subject.

"Fine," he sighed. "Let's get all of you something to eat in the meantime. You must be hungry."

/

Meanwhile, Allura and Coran were helping Jude settle into a pod. The white body suit felt too much like the prison uniform, but she didn't want to complain. The team was fixing her up out of the goodness of their hearts after all.

"Now Jude," Coran said. "You might feel a slight tingling sensation, but that's completely normal. You'll be asleep before you know it." The moustached man spoke as he adjusted the proper belts and harnesses.

"How long will I be in here," Jude asked as she marveled at the soft blue light of her tube.

"Only a few hours," he chirped.

"And there will be someone here to keep an eye on you at all times," Allura shouted from a control panel in the center of the room. "This is going to feel like a short nap. You just won't be able to shift into a REM cycle because the pod uses your brain activity to speed up the healing process."

"So I won't be able to dream?"

"No," the princess answered. "But you won't be aware of what's going on outside of the pod either."

Jude was relieved. The last thing she wanted was to get a night terror inside of enclosed space.

Coran fastened the last belt and grinned at the girl.

"We'll be seeing you in a few hours."

"Okay," she said with her bravest smile. But the truth was that she didn't feel brave at all. The tube felt cold, and sterile and unwelcoming overall. The last time Jude had been taken to anything remotely similar to a medical bay, she left with a new scar and something burning in her veins. And there was no guarantee that this time would be any different.

The pod door shut slowly as cold blast of air settled in. There was a strange tickle in Jude's nose and her toes, but her eyes shut before she could give it any more thought.

/

Hunk had just served the last breakfast when the other three paladins walked into the kitchen. Between Lance and Shiro, Pidge was the first to inquire about the absence of their new guest.

"Hey, is Jude already in a healing pod?" She grabbed a bowl from the cupboard before continuing. "I was hoping to talk to her before she got stuck in there."

"Yeah," Keith huffed. "Allura and Coran wanted to get her fixed up the second the cryochamber opened up."

It wasn't unusual for keith to be a bit of a grouch in the mornings, but he seemed a little more miffed than usual. And being egged on by Lance wasn't going to improve his mood by a long shot.

"Why are you so peeved? What, did you want to talk to her too Keith," he teased with a smug look. "Are you also worried about the pretty little Earth girl?"

For a second, the red paladin's eyes matched his lion and Lance felt a knot of terror form in his stomach. Luckily for him, Shiro stepped in before Keith had the chance to put _him_ in a cryopod.

"It's not the time, Lance. Jude might have some pretty serious injuries that we didn't notice yesterday. She might be in there for longer than we thought."

Shiro had the inexplicable talent of being leaderly and sensible at any time of the day, even with a 5 o'clock shadow. But even the fearless head of Voltron jumped when an unfamiliar elder alien cleared her throat and joined the conversation.

"It's true that she was hurt badly, but the child will probably take less time in the chamber than any of us," she said as she sipped from her cup.

"What makes you say that?" The black paladin answered after he had gathered himself.

"She has been "enhanced" by the Galra, much like yourself." She acknowledged his prosthetic upgrade. "So she is much more resilient than any of us."

"I thought you said that you wouldn't tell us what the Galra did to her," Keith said.

"Oh I'm not," she said contentedly. And she took another healthy gulp from her cup.

"Then why did you tell us that she's "enhanced" if you weren't going to give us any details?!" Lance practically shouted at the old woman, but she was too engrossed by her drink to notice.

"It doesn't really matter guys," Pidge piped up. "The pod is going to pull up her entire medical history, so we're going to find out what they did to her anyhow."

Almost on cue, Coran's voice blasted over the castle's PA system.

"Paladins, please come to the Cryo-room."


	4. Chapter 4

When the team entered the room, Coran and Allura were hovering over the control panel.

"Princess, what's wrong?" Shiro was concerned; the announcement sounded so urgent. Allura's face was wrought with fear.

"It's Jude," she said, trembling as she she scanned the holo-screens displaying the girl's progress. "This shouldn't be possible."

Her big blue eyes and cheeks had sunk into the crevices in her skull as she scanned the screens over and over. The entire team was quiet. Not even the _tak tak tak_ of the mice's feet could be heard scuffling about the massive room. Only Pidge had ventured to ask what everyone else was afraid to.

"What shouldn't be possible? Is Jude going to be okay?" Her hands began to tremble as the princess continued to stare blankly at the screens. Coran rested a firm hand on the Allura's shoulder before gently pulling her away from the screen.

"Jude's injuries are going to heal without any complication," he said slowly. "It's just…" he trailed off, thinking about how to phrase this new development correctly.

"Spit it out, Coran," Lance said. "You guys are seriously freaking us out. Can't you just fix whatever's wrong with her?"

Coran and the Princess gave eachother a nervous glance before he answered.

"It isn't necessarily a problem per se," Coran said. "We've just never seen anything like this before."

"Does this have anything to do with the little girl from the prison thinking that Jude would explode if we "cooked her for too long"?" Hunk asked.

"I hope it shouldn't come to that," Allura answered. "But it could be a possibility."

"Whoa! Why is there a possibility that she could explode?!" Lance shouted.

The other paladins erupted into a small uproar and began yelling a great many questions at the same time. The princess let out an ear splitting whistle in order to get their attention, causing everyone to groan in pain. Nevertheless, they calmed down enough to let her explain the situation.

"Jude is doing just fine in terms of health. However, it has become quite clear that she had been tested on by the Galra for an extended period of time. She is nothing like the monsters that Zarkon's Druids often send our way, but she has an astoundingly high amount of untapped energy stored in her body."

"How much energy qualifies as astoundingly high," Shiro asked.

"She has the quintessence of a dying star concentrated in her circulatory system. Every cell in her entire body contains raw quintessence, which might be very dangerous," she explained. "It's almost four times as potent as what Zarkon has been harvesting when he drains an entire planet."

"We think he was trying to create a new weapon or a super soldier," Coran added. "But the amount of raw energy in Jude's body should've killed her."

"So what does this mean," Shiro asked.

"She could be a ticking time-bomb," Coran sighed. "Or she could be an extremely valuable asset to Voltron."

"But Zarkon sapped the energy from a star and injected it into this girl who is barely bigger than me," Pidge said. "What happens if she goes supernova?"

"We don't know," Coran replied. "Someday, she might die peacefully at a very old age like a normal human, or she just might implode on herself at any given moment. There's an infinite amount of possibilities."

"I hate to be a downer, always," Hunk said nervously. "But uh, what happens if she implodes here on the ship? Is it just a small thing, or does she wipe out anything within a three-galaxy-radius?" He fidgeted with his headband as he went over every horrifying possibility that popped into his head.

"If she was going to wipe out a galaxy, it would've happened by now," Coran interjected. "She must have some control over this energy if she has been alive for this long."

"Oh, she has plenty of control," Keith added. "I saw her levitate this morning. Her feet lit up and it was the freakiest thing I've ever seen in my life."

"How come you didn't bring this up earlier," Allura snapped.

"Jude asked me not to. And I wanted to wait and see if there was a reasonable explanation," he shrugged. "I wasn't even sure what I saw." He looked at her sleeping form in the pod, still baffled by the events that had taken place before breakfast.

"Even if that is the case, you still have to run it by me," Shiro said sternly. "We are a team and we all have to be on the same page when it comes to important issues like this."

"So what do we do," Lance asked. "Are we going to let her stay on the ship?"

"Of course," Coran said. "She's been through enough as it is. It's not like we can just leave her on an asteroid somewhere, that's inhumane."

"Above all, Jude is still a person and we will treat her as such. It is our sworn duty to protect every innocent being in the universe."

"She's right, guys," Shiro added. "It can be tough to transition out of that prison mindset, especially considering the circumstances that Jude has been in. Even if she is a dangerous super weapon, the last thing we want is for Zarkon to use her to his advantage."

The group looked at the unconscious girl in the pod with concern. It didn't seem possible that someone so small had the power to destroy worlds. And now they were harboring her on the ship!

"So, how much longer is she going to be stuck in there," Pidge asked.

"A few more hours," Coran replied. "She has some pretty serious injuries."

"I thought broken bones didn't take long to heal in the pod," Lance said as he peered through the glass chamber.

" Yes, but Jude's sternum has been broken multiple times. And she has an obscene amount of scar tissue built up in her chest; it's going to take awhile to break down," Coran said with a frown. "It looks like they operated on her heart several times, which is probably the reason all of this quintessence is getting pumped through her system."

"Is there anything we can do to get it out of her system?" Shiro asked.

"I wish there was," the princess sighed. "It looks like she has been receiving steady doses until her body began to reproduce its own supply of quintessence. If we wanted to fix her, she'd need a blood transfusion that would replace all of the blood in her body and a heart transplant."

"And we wouldn't be able to find her a donor unless we went back to Earth," Shiro said. "Which is all the more reason to track down Zarkon and destroy the empire."

The black paladin stared blankly into the pod and rubbed his mechanical arm distractedly. Every time he saw her, he just delved deeper into a pool of confusion. They were similar in many ways; they had been captured by the Galra, subjected to horrendous experiments, and thrown into a crucial role in the rebellion. The only difference between them was that Shiro actually had the experience needed to fight this war. Jude was still just a kid; and even if she had an infinite supply of untapped power, she didn't know how to use it.

Suddenly, an alarm snapped him out of his thoughts and a familiar light flashed throughout the castle. The ship was under attack.

"Paladins, get to your lions now," The princess barked.

Everyone sprinted to the hangars and prepared for battle as Coran and Allura focused on manning the ship. These type of battles with small Galra fleets were becoming more and more common, but they never felt any less frightening. The entire team gave one hundred percent during every battle, and this one was no different.

However, before anyone could actually reach the zip lines to their lions, an unfamiliar face showed up on the communication monitor in the main control center.

"Paladins of Voltron," a Galra captain growled. "You have stolen personal property from emperor Zarkon."

"People aren't property," the princess yelled back. However, the captain acted as if he hadn't heard Allura at all and continued what seemed to be an overly prepared speech.

"Return the Earth female to me, or suffer the consequences. We will not hesitate to destroy this ship and everyone on board if you refuse."

"You will not be taking anyone," Allura retaliated. Although she was trembling at the mention of Jude, finally grasping how serious the situation was.

"You leave me with no choice, then," he said with a wicked smile. The screen abruptly blacked out as the first missile crashed into the ship's particle barrier, rattling the entire system. The paladins took that as their cue to leave ASAP.

/

The fight was a blur. Thankfully the enemy didn't have a genetically enhanced beast like they did most of of the time. But what they lacked in terrifying alien robots, they made up for in numbers.

Galra fighter jets swarmed Voltron from all sides, even Hunk's specialty shoulder cannon was beginning to lose juice as the fleet seemingly grew larger.

"Shiro, we can't shake these guys," Lance yelled. "Maybe we should split up and cover more ground."

"No," the leader said. "If we break up, it'll be too easy to get overpowered individually. We have to stay together!"

A red light began to flash in the cockpit, along with a warning siren.

"We're having system failures in the main engine," Pidge said as she began tinkering with her control panel. "The ship could die at any second!"

A nervous sweat itched down the black Paladins neck. They were surrounded from all sides and there was no way to move the ship to a less compromising position. Their only option was to seek assistance from the castle.

"Allura, can you hear me?!" He shouted.

Her voice crackled faintly over the communication line. "Shiro!"

"We need cover, Voltron is going down fast!"

"We can't get to you at the moment," she shouted back. The rumbling of the castle could be heard over the speaker. "The castle is under heavy fire and I can't open a wormhole with all of this shooting!"

Bits of the ceiling were coming down as Allura strained to control the castle.

"Coran, what's our status," she grunted.

"Defenses are down forty percent. Princess, I don't know how much longer the particle barrier will hold," he panicked.

Not a second later, the castle went dark. All systems were down and the only sound that could be heard was the enemy gunfire boring itself into the exterior of the castle. Everything had been shut off, communications, defenses, weaponry; everything. The princess could only look at her advisor in complete horror before he clutched her arm and ran out the door.

"We have to evacuate the ship," Coran hollered. They ran down the darkened corridors before Allura realized who they were forgetting.

"I have to go back for Jude!" Jude was still in the medical bay, probably terrified to wake up to a real life nightmare.

"Allura, it's too dangerous!" But the princess was having none of it.

"I'll get there as fast as I can, but get the refugees to somewhere safe. If I'm not there in twenty minutes, start evacuating!"

"But Princess-!"

"That's an order,Coran," she commanded. Without missing a beat, she turned on her heel and ran towards the healing pods, leaving her advisor alone and in the dark. Allura couldn't bear to turn back, she couldn't bear to think about what might happen if she couldn't save everyone in time.

No, now was the time to be strong. Her feet pounded harder with each step until she could make out the shape of a singular pod in the dark. She lunged at the case and began tearing wires and harnesses from the sleeping Earthling. However, Jude never moved. She should've been awake the second the pod lost power, but Allura didn't have time to fuss over that now; she had to get Jude out of here. The princess violently shook the girl, trying to wake her; but it did no good.

"Jude, Jude," she practically screamed. "Wake up, Jude!" But the girl remained in a silent slumber, unmoving. The princess panicked, pressing her elfin ear to the girl's chest, making sure that her heart was beating. At first, there was nothing. The frightened princess pressed her ear even harder to the girl's chest, praying that the power outage hadn't killed her.

 _Ba-dum_

Hope rose in the princess's chest as she listened more intently.

 _Ba-dum. Ba-dumdum. Ba-dumdumdumdum. Bad-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum-bad-dum._

Ecstatic, Allura shook her again. Only, when Jude's eyes fluttered open, they were glowing an unnatural gold. The princess took a step back when the girl wordlessly floated out of the pod, her entire body slowly encasing itself in the same light.

Allura was too terrified to scream, all she could do was watch silently as Jude levitated towards the main control room. Her hair trailed behind her like an afterthought, leaving behind a shimmering golden powder as she sauntered through the hub. When she finally rested at Allura's panel, she only waved her hand before the screen lit up once again. Jude never pressed a specific button, but when she gently laid her finger on the screen, the particle barrier went up in an instant. The girl could've been pressing any series of buttons, but in her dreamlike state, she still managed to grab the solar cannon and aimed at anything within eyeshot.

The princess silently slid behind Coran's station and watched the ships' metrics steadily rise. Their offensive systems had never been so high, the particle barrier never so resilient . Somehow, Jude was subconsciously channeling her quintessence through the ship and making it stronger, like a battery.

Allura almost shied away at the thought of trying to give Jude battle strategies, because there was no way to get through to her in this state. But she had to try _something._ Instead of yelling out commands as per usual, the princess tapped into Jude's controls and began directing fire wherever she saw fit. Within seconds, the girl was incinerating rows of ships with the flick of the wrist, all while powering the ship and keeping the defenses up. In no time, they were able to blast their way to Voltron and provide support as they made their way to the castle.

Now keep in mind, the communications hadn't been up and running yet, so the Paladins had no idea what was going on. One minute they were facing certain death, and the next the castle came flying to their rescue. Nobody had even the slightest clue of what, or rather _who_ had been powering the ship. At this point, they were just thankful to be out of the line of fire when they came running into the hub.

When they actually came aboard, they were completely floored to see Jude engulfed in a blinding golden light and hovering above the helm of the ship.

"Princess, what happened," Shiro asked unblinking.

"I'll explain later, just keep her steady so I can start a wormhole jump." Allura began to fiddle with the controls once again until there was a familiar tugging sensation throughout the ship. A wormhole formed just as the paladins awkwardly clutched the floating girl by the arms and legs, still unable to yank her to the ground. However, when the ship entered the mouth of the hole, the force was enough to knock the girl down, taking down the rest of the team.

Jude's head knocked into a cold chestplate, which instantly snapped her awake. Sleepy tears stung the corners of her eyes as she tried to process what was going on.

"What happened," she asked groggily. Only when she sat up, did she notice the pile of paladins underneath her. "Why are we all on the ground?"

"Well, you knocked us down after you were done zoning into the avatar state," Lance groaned from the bottom of the heap.

Jude scrambled away from the group like a distressed animal. Her breaths became shallow as she began to process what had just happened. Had she lost control? Did she hurt someone?

"Oh my god," she cried. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"Jude, you saved us," Allura said. "We were under attack, the ship lost power. You were able to tap into the mainframe and bring the particle barrier back up. You practically wiped out an entire fleet of Galra ships."

"Wait, all of that was Jude," Pidge gasped. Well, the entire group was pretty taken aback. Usually, the particle barrier couldn't be repaired for a couple of days if it had been damaged badly enough; so the fact that the girl was able to restore power to the entire ship within a matter of minutes was an amazing feat. But at the same time, it was kind of terrifying.

The group stared at her blankly. It seemed like there wasn't a proper response to the situation. They were happy to be safe, no doubt about it, but they also needed time to digest the situation.

In an attempt to escape their burning stares, she rose slowly and tried to steady herself against the wall.

"I'm going to check on the others and make sure that they're okay."

Then she wobbled away from the group without another word.


	5. Chapter 5

**Sorry I haven't uploaded in a minute, guys! I'll try to be faster with the next one!**

 **-m**

Jude was sitting and quietly visiting with the prisoners and Coran when the Paladins walked into the common room. They all felt guilty for making the girl feel so isolated, especially since she had just saved them from certain death. It was apparent that she had gotten Coran up to speed on the situation, considering the daggers that he was shooting at the group. It was good that he wasn't too fazed by the supernatural phenomenon that occurred only an hour ago, but his death glare didn't make it any less uncomfortable for the group to look Jude in the eye and apologize without cowering in fear. Pidge, however, was the first to step up.

"Jude," she said shakily. She didn't really respond with words as much as a sad smile; which was worse than not responding at all. Pidge gulped before she continued. "We didn't say thank you for saving us, and we _all_ feel really bad about it."

"Guys, I understand," Jude said reassuringly. "I completely blacked out, and I had no idea what was going on or what I was doing. Things could've ended really badly, and it's obviously too risky for me to stay on the ship. I think we'll all be better off if I stay in the shelter with the rest of the refugees when we land on Arus."

"WHAT?!," the group gasped in unison. However, Jude looked completely calm. It was apparent that she had given the situation a lot of thought, and she truly believed that she was doing the right thing.

"It's too dangerous for me stay here and put you all in jeopardy," she shrugged. "It's for the best, you know?"

"But if weren't for you, we wouldn't have made it out of there in one piece," Hunk said. "You can't go."

"That's really sweet, Hunk," she smiled. "But you saw what happened; sure everything turned out okay this time, but I still don't know how this whole energy surplus works. What happens next time? I could blow up the castle!"

Coran put a firm hand on her shoulder," Jude, we can work with this. We can help you learn how to control it."

"Coran, I don't even know what _it_ is," she choked. The paladins grimaced at her reaction. They knew exactly what was going on with Jude, but they didn't know how to say it. They didn't know if it was their place, but their leader always knew the right thing to say. Their eyes darted at him expectantly.

"Well," Shiro stepped in. "The results from the healing pod showed us what the Druids did." Her eyes practically popped out of her skull.

"Really? Is it something that we can fix," she asked. Jude tried to remain neutral, but her heart leapt into her throat at the news. Maybe Coran could remove whatever the Druids put into her and she could still stay on the ship and fight the war.

"It's not necessarily something that can be fixed,"Coran said. Something in his three hearts snapped when he saw the hope fade out of Jude's eyes. "Right now, your body is outputting a high level of concentrated quintessence. If you wanted to stop producing so much of it, you would need a heart transplant back on Earth."

"Oh," she sniffed. She clutched her chest as that familiar knot began to swell up. She tried to push it down, but her eyes flickered gold for a split second before she willed it away. "I understand."

A familiar four-armed-alien shuffled over to give the girl some reassurance, heaven knows she needed it.

"Dear child," she said, pulling Jude in for a hug. "It matters not what flows through your veins. You have a good heart, and I know that you will use it to protect the victims of Zarkon's reign." Jude clung to her like a child when heard those words.

"I'm scared," she whispered. A tear glowed faintly as it slid down Jude's cheek.

The elderly woman gingerly wiped it away with a smile.

"I know you are," she said in a hushed tone. " But you need to look beyond your fear so you can grow." Jude remained silent, but nodded in approval. She knew that Gran and the others were right no matter how much she wished they weren't. She sucked back a stream of mocos and wiped her eyes before facing the others.

"Okay," her voice shook. "I'll stay, but we need to establish some ground rules."

"Ground rules?", Lance asked.

Jude held up her index finger to the group. "First of all, you guys have to stop cringing whenever you see me. You all look like I shot your dog, and quite frankly it's depressing."

"We do not cringe whenever we see you," Keith argued.

"Didn't you get decked by the simulator when Shiro and Allura dragged me by the training room last night?" Jude asked. The Paladins stifled a few snickers when Keith gave them a dirty look.

"That was just a love tap," he grumbled. Although he was just as guilty as the rest of the paladins when it came to staring at Jude with a sullen expression.

"Fine," she agreed. "But you guys need to tone it down a little with the pity party. I'm not dying or anything, I just have some extra energy floating around; which leads me to the second rule. You have to treat me the same way you treat each other. I've gotta do a lot of learning if I want to get a handle on all of this quintessence, so you have to push me in the right direction. I want to learn whatever I can from all of you so I can actually be able to help out with the resistance."

"That's the plan, Shiro smiled. "But in the meantime, you need to get some rest."

"Yeah," Lance agreed. You're actually not supposed to move around so much after the pod spits you out."

"What do you mean," she said quizzically. "I took out an entire fleet of Galra ships after the pod spit me out and I'm doing just fine."

"Yeah, but you're going to get jelly legs the second you stand up," he said very as-a-matter-of-factly.

"Pssh, no," Jude laughed. "I've never felt better."

Then she sprang up with her hands on her hips, and stood totally upright for about two ticks. Almost in slow motion, her knees buckled under her weight and she fell flat on her face. Without moving she mumbled," See? Never better."

"Alright, Tiger," Lance chuckled as he scraped her off the floor. "Let's get some food goo in you and see how you feel after that."

Something irked Keith when he saw Lance loop Jude's arm around his shoulder. He wasn't attempting to flirt with her, so she wasn't trying to twist his arm or beat him away with a stick and she looked _comfortable_. In fact, he was just casually playful when he called her "Tiger". Lance probably could've managed to get her to crack a smile if she hadn't been so exhausted.

"I just ate," she whined as he lead her to the kitchen. He gave her a tiny squeeze when she tried to argue, and the red paladin's' ears blazed red in anger. Even though he payed no mind to his inflamed ears, a certain bespectacled tech wizard happened to glance over at him during just the right moment.

"That was almost six hours ago, you could stand to have something to eat," Hunk said. Then he proceeded to follow them around the corner.

Pidge probably would have gone too, but she decided to stay back for a couple of minutes instead. With the absolutely most shit-eating grin, she poked the red paladin in the side.

"You've been awfully quiet, Keith," she teased. "Don't you wanna go check on her and see that she's getting some fluids?" He rolled his eyes.

"No Pidge," he answered coolly. "Hunk and Lance are already over there. Watching her eat doesn't have to be a group activity."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. I'm sure that Lance will keep an eye on her."

"What's that supposed to mean," he mumbled.

"It doesn't _mean_ anything," she grinned. "I'm just making an observation."

Keith glared at her, knowing exactly what she was getting at. He didn't like Jude that way. He may have been displaying some unusual behavior, but he just felt bad for her. The girl's life just seemed like it was one trainwreck after another, so _someone_ had to make sure that she didn't spiral into some sort of state of perpetual panic. Keith had already done his time, so now it was Lance's turn to keep an eye on her for a few hours. It didn't matter that the blue paladin would probably be laying all the cheesy pickup lines on her and get to sit close to her in the common room all night. It was fine. Absolutely fine. Absolutely. Fine.

From across the room shiro sucked in the biggest dad sigh and broke Keith's train of thought.

"Don't egg him on, Pidge. Jude is a part of the team now and Keith has been looking out for her just like the rest of us," he said.

Pidge shied away when their fearless leader gave her a stern warning look and promptly dropped the subject. However, she was sure to keep this little exchange filed away for another time. She might get to have a little fun with Keith another time.

"Well, I don't know about you guys, but I'm starving," Pidge said with an enthusiastic pat on the belly. "I'll just go grab a bite with everyone else; should I save a couple of bowls for you?"

"We'll be down there in a little bit," Shiro said. "Go ahead without us."

When the green paladin left the room, Shiro turned to Keith with a bewildered expression. This resulted in a shrug of the shoulders on the red paladin's end.

"How the hell did you see her do all of that this morning and not tell anybody? That's not like you, Keith."

"She only levitated a few inches off the floor, I didn't know that she could barbecue spaceships with her mind," he defended.

"Yeah well, I don't think Jude knew either," Shiro said, rubbing his temple. He looked worried, and he had every right. Shiro had seen the kind of monsters the Druids had produced and what they were capable of. He wanted to believe that she was a harmless kid that they were just trying to send back to Earth in one piece, but that wasn't the case anymore. Jude essentially had the power to obliterate small planets and there was a good chance it would become an issue in the future.

"You okay?" Keith broke Shiro's train of thought.

"Yeah," he replied. "We've just got our work cut out for us, that's all."

Meanwhile, everyone else was sharing some mutually exhausted groans in the mess hall.

"It's going to take us forever to recalibrate all of the lions," Pidge mumbled. Hunk was slumped over in his seat and let out an exasperated squeak in response.

"Don't remind me," he said. "I don't even want to _look_ at the control panels. All of the systems are shot, and we probably won't be able to tap into the ships' energy hull until we land."

"Guys, you've got the most powerful battery in the universe sitting at the table," Lance cut in. "You probably won't even need to wait until we get to Arus to jumpstart Voltron."

Jude nearly choked on her food at the mention of powering up the lions, and she coughed profusely in protest.

Slapping a hand on her chest, she wheezed in panic,"Please no." She wheezed again." Don't wanna….break. I don't want to break them."

Lance smacked her on the back and tried to get her to calm down.

"I was just joking, Jude!" The initial shock of seeing the space battery choke on the intergalactic equivalent of jello raised his blood pressure to dangerous levels in less than three ticks. Her reaction scared him, but he got over it when she stopped coughing.

"I'm sorry," she rasped. "I just. I'm sorry." Jude stared blankly at the bowl of goo and tried to shake the the panic out of her system. Hunks' huge heart swelled at the sight of their new friend shaking like a leaf, and he lowered his voice so he wouldn't alarm her.

"Jude, it's okay," he coaxed. "We aren't going to force you to do anything you don't want to do. You don't have to go anywhere near the lions if you don't want."

"I want to help," she whispered. "I just want to figure out how to get control over the whole "battery" situation. The thing with the Galra fleet...I've never done something that big before, and it kind of freaked me out."

"But you've done something similar before?" Pidge asked. She'd be lying if she pretended not to be intrigued about the events from earlier that day. Her mind was already racing with ideas about how Jude could improve the ship, and she was dying to fit the girl with some interactive tech.

"Yeah, but just little stuff," Jude shrugged. "I never floated more than a couple of inches off the ground until today, and I guess that I'm warmer than I used to be?"

"Warmer?" Lance raised an eyebrow in her direction.

"I used to have super icy toes and fingers," she said. "But now I'm kind of like an electric blanket, so I guess that's good when you're floating through the cold abyss of space." Everyone chuckled at Jude's little joke.

"I don't know if I convinced," Lance teased. "Good circulation doesn't necessarily fall into the superpower category."

"It does too," she pouted. "When I get home, I'll probably be able to keep the same cup of coffee warm for hours! Seriously Lance, feel my hands!" Then she reached over and grabbed the blue paladin's large hands and let her own distribute heat to his bony fingers. He wasn't very impressed.

"Lame," he blurted out. "Hunk is pretty much the same temperature."

"What?!" Jude was a little disappointed, so far this was the only benefit that came with all of the experimenting that she got put through. "Gimme a sec."

She squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated as hard as she could. She sucked in a shaky breath and tried to feel for something familiar. The knot in her chest was back, but this time she wasn't scared. Instead, Jude coaxed the knot loose and pushed a little surge of energy through her fingers. As her hands lit up, warmth began to radiate through her skin. It was barely noticeable at first, but heat slowly branched out of her hands until the blue paladin felt like he was holding a big mug of hot chocolate. Lance tried his best not to screech and let out a disgruntled cough instead.

Jude cracked an eye open and a huge smile spread across her face. "HA!"

Pidge, being the child she was, immediately jumped over the table; but she couldn't actually hop over it successfully so she landed on her belly. The fact that she was lying in a pile of green goo didn't faze her one bit as she scrambled to swipe Jude's hands away.

"That's amazing! I thought you said you couldn't control it?!" The green paladin lit up like a Christmas tree. This was huge discovery, after all.

"This is the only thing that I know how to do, though. It still doesn't work half of the time and-" Her hands abruptly flickered out. "It never lasts long."

"Oh, what," Pidge whined.

"Yeah, the Galra soldiers weren't exactly quaking in their boots when I was in prison. I wasn't even big enough to be in the gladiator ring, and they'll stick _anyone_ in there," she said with a shrug. "It was kind of a long-standing joke with the other inmates." Hunk and Lance began to snicker, but Pidge was able to shut them up with her icy glare. One look, and they nervously covered their laughs with coughs.

"Don't worry about it," she said brightly. "Short girls have to stick together, right?"

"Thanks, Pidge," Jude said with a yawn.

Lance noticed her sudden lack of energy and asked," You doing okay there, Sleeping Beauty?"

"Yeah," she said drowsily. "I guess it's because I was in the pod."

"You also fried a fleet of Galra ships and jumpstarted a gigantic castle," Pidge chirped. "I'd be pretty wiped out too."

"Mm-hmm," she hummed. "Maybe a quick nap will do me some good?"

"Nah-uh. Shiro said that you're going to need a full nights' rest, and his word is law," Hunk said rather seriously.

"Really? Is he that strict?" Jude yawned again as she got up to put her half eaten bowl in the sink.

"Well no, but he usually comes from a place of genuine concern, so we just listen to him anyway."

"That's fair," she said with droopy eyes. "I really wanna get out of this cryosuit before I go to bed though." She pulled at the collar of the white suit, which was skin tight and suffocating.

"I've got some extra clothes you can borrow," Pidge said.

When the two girls entered Pidge's room, Jude made sure to step over all of the wires on the floor as carefully as possible. There was a desk covered in strange hand tools and various little machines that whirred and beeped when their builder entered the room. As Jude looked around the room in awe, the green paladin began digging around in a nearby dresser for some extra clothes.

"Hey," Pidge called. "Think fast!"

Then she tossed a shirt and pants at Jude's head, resulting in her letting out an audible "Oof." Pidge payed her no mind.

"I kind of like oversized stuff, since it's the closest thing you can get to sweats out here," She shrugged.

"Oh dude, that's perfect," Jude said happily. "I'm just excited that it isn't another jumpsuit."

"Yeah, you'll get more clothes of your own as we go on more missions. Civilians usually give us spares if we rescue their planet or something," she chirped. "But you can borrow some of my stuff until then."

"Really!? Oh my god, thanks!"

Jude was ecstatic. This meant that she wouldn't have to borrow oversized dresses from the princess; and Pidge was close enough to her height that her clothes wouldn't fit too small.

"I really owe you one, Pidge"

By the time Jude had actually changed and flopped down on the bed in her room, pure exhaustion had set in. She knew that she would have to fall asleep eventually, but she was avoiding it at all costs.

As she stared at the ceiling, Jude slowly raised her hand and grimaced at it as she thought about everything that had happened today. Until today, she had never known why the Druids were always working on her or why they kept her separated from the other prisoners. She had always wanted answers, but now she wasn't exactly thrilled to know that she had such destructive powers.

She slowly curled into a ball in the corner of the bed as gravity began to impose itself on her eyelids. Sleep began to settle in her bones as she peeled back the covers; and she only managed to stick one leg under the sheets before she conked out.

 _Again, Jude was strapped to a table in a dark room. Several hooded figures pinned her down as another pulled out the glowing scalpel that had plagued her existence. Except this time, she had no fear._

 _Jude laid still as a corpse, unfeeling and uncaring. She didn't even brace for the agonizing burn or horrifying crack of her sternum being ripped apart. Instead, the tip of the knife singed her skin before a searing golden light filled the entire room. In all of the blind chaos, Jude could only hear the blood curdling screaming of the Druids._

Jude shot straight up out of bed with a thin sheen of sweat coating her palms. Shivers clawed their way up and down her spine, wracking her entire body with fear. Shaky hands matched her shaky breaths. Her heart was beating at the speed of light and now she was wide awake.

The girl decided to get out of bed, because there was no way that she was going back to sleep now.

Her bare feet hit the ground and she decided to head towards the kitchen. Now she knew where Coran kept the tea, so maybe she could make a cup and relax enough to go back to sleep.

After navigating through all of the corridors, Jude finally made it to the kitchen. The room must abe have had a sensor, because the lights flicked on when she crossed the threshold. She wiped the sleep out of her eyes as she walked towards the sink. Aside from the spring in Allura's room, Jude still didn't know where the restroom was in the ship. She'd just have to make due splashing water on her face in the kitchen.

Jude stuck her hand under the tap to make sure that a cold stream of water was running before she splashed her face. She perked up a little after her face was thoroughly drenched and dried it off with the front of her shirt.

She shook a few stray droplets off her hands before hoisting herself onto the counter. Standing up slowly, Jude prayed that her feet would suction themselves to the metal surface as she swung a cabinet door open. Luckily she had chosen the right one, and the girl saw the jar that she had been looking for alongside Coran's kettle. Jude eagerly snatched them off of the top shelf before jumping down from the countertop. She landed on the floor with a thud that echoed throughout the room, but there was no one around to hear it.

Or at least she thought that there was no one around to hear it. Little did she know that up the hall, an incredibly sweaty red paladin was just finishing up a session with a thoroughly pummeled training bot.

Keith had been walking to the showers when he heard a loud THUD from the kitchen. He instinctively activated his bayard and took a deep breath before drawing his bayard. Slowly approaching the entrance, he decided count to three before jumping out and attacking the possible intruder. _One._ He raised his bayard. _Two._ He adjusted his footing. _Three._ He pounced.


	6. Chapter 6

_YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO REBEL MATT HOLT IS CANON. I CALLED IT DURING SEASON ONE. I WRITE SLOW AS SHIT BUT I CALLED IT. Thanks for being so patient guys! Enjoy :D_

A blood-curdling shriek rang in the kitchen as the kettle fell the ground with a clatter. Keith's eyes widened as he realized that the intruder was actually Jude. His lips shrunk into a thin line as his brain registered what had just happened. The color completely drained out of his face at the realization that he just stabbed the girl that had saved the lives of him and his team members from certain death. His head started spinning at the sight of the dark stain growing on her shirt.

She grabbed her side as blood began to seep through the fabric of the sweater that she had borrowed from Pidge. The color was beginning to leave her face and hands as she started to yell instructions at the red paladin.

"Okay Samurai Jack, stay with me," she exclaimed a little too loudly. Her knees began to buckle, so she held onto the counter for support. "I'm gonna be fine, just give me your belt!"

"Uh okay," He yelled back. Keith didn't mean to yell, but he was completely unnerved by the girl's rock solid composure. He did as he was told and undid his belt with shaky fingers. "What do I do?! Oh my god, WHAT DO I DO!?"

"Hey, it's gonna be okay, buddy," she choked. "I need you to tighten the belt around the cut and we're just going to keep pressure on it until we get to the infirmary."

"O-okay," he agreed. He hastily wrapped the belt around her midsection, resulting in her groaning loudly when he cut the slack. His face was flush with panic when she flinched.

"Is it too tight?! Do I need to loosen it?!"

Jude threw up her hand in protest. "No! We want it as tight as possible."

Again, she winced at the pain of the fresh wound, but did her best to stay upright. Jude couldn't have Keith panicking, or else she'd probably pass out from the shock before they even made it out of the kitchen. However, the guy still looked like a deer in the headlights at the sight of her white-knuckling the counter.

"Okay bub, I need you to focus on my face and not on the cut," she tried to say calmly. However, his eyes didn't move from her torso. Realizing that he hadn't heard her, Jude grabbed his wrist and his attention snapped to to her face. She made sure to hold unwavering eye-contact with him so he could concentrate on her instructions.

"Keith, sweetie, I'm fine," she reassured. "It's a superficial wound. We need to get either Shiro, Allura, or Coran down to the infirmary to help. I might need a couple of stitches, but we're gonna pray that this will cauterize."

Luckily enough, three sets of feet came barreling down the hall followed by a lot of yelling. There was a mix of "What's wrong"s and "what happened"s, and when they finally reached the kitchen their faces dropped. Before any of them could say anything, Jude jumped in on her own behalf.

"It's not deep," she choked. "But it doesn't feel great and I think I might need a couple of stitches, so we'll explain later."

All of the adults nodded in unison with hanging jaws. Jude stumbled forward; but before she could fall flat on her face, Keith caught her and scooped her into his arms in one fluid motion. After that, everything was kind of a blur. Jude remembered seeing the gentle blue lights in the hall fading in and out of her field of vision as group whizzed to the infirmary. She could've sworn that she heard two muddled accents yelling at the red paladin, and possibly a disappointed Shiro; but she couldn't be sure. After that, everything went black.

When she woke up, it took a lot of effort to open her heavy eyelids. The soft cushion of a mattress was cradling her weakened form and the dull buzz of the LED lights overhead made her feel fuzzy. She scratched her head only to realize that the braid that she had been sporting was replaced by her untamed locks. The girl was confused when the chord progression from "Dear Prudence" was quietly humming throughout the room. When she turned to see where it was coming from, her eyes grew wide at the sight of the figure hunched over in the chair beside the bed.

The red paladin had dozed off, using the bedside table to rest his arm and prop up his head. Next to him was her ipod, gently blasting music. The earlier events were slowly catching up to her as she began to wake up more. She was in the kitchen, trying to figure out how the stupid space stove worked and then…

And then Keith fucking _stabbed_ her. But he looked so terrified afterward? It had to have been a mistake. Nevertheless, Jude needed answers.

She stretched over and gently nudged his arm. When his eyes snapped open, she reeled back, trying not to raise another dangerous reaction out of him.

"Keith, what happened?"

The red paladin blinked his dark eyes at her, trying to find the right words. It felt like an eternity before he opened up his mouth to speak.

"Um, you were in the kitchen," he started. "And I thought I heard an intruder, my bayard was already drawn and in the heat of the moment I attacked." He took a big gulp. Even in the dark, Jude could see the guilt riddled all over his face.

"But you were great," he rambled. "You gave me solid instructions and showed me how to put pressure on the wound. It was just a little deeper than you originally thought, so we had to put you in the pod again."

"Okay," she said weakly. "How long have I been out?"

"Only a couple of hours," he said, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

"Oh man, have you been holed up in here the entire time that I was asleep?"

Keith rubbed the sleep out of his eyes as he replied," Yeah."

"Really?," she gasped. "Isn't it uncomfortable to sleep in a chair like that?"

"Yeah," he yawned. "But not as uncomfortable as being stabbed."

"Oh come on, don't beat yourself up over that," she said in a reassuring tone. "I'm all fixed up, and I didn't even need stitches. Don't you want to go to bed?"

"I just wanted to make sure that you'd be okay," he answered quietly. "Going into the pod saps your energy enough as it is, but going twice in one day can compromise your immune system. I just want to be here if you need anything."

"That's very nice of you," she said with a yawn. "But I'm good. Just go get some sleep."

"I'm not taking my chances." he yawned. "No arguments, I'm staying."

She rolled her eyes and let out a huff. It wasn't worth it to fight with him at this ungodly hour. Jude would settle for a healthy compromise instead.

With a great deal of effort, she rolled onto the other side of the bed and lazily patted the empty space on the mattress.

"All right tough guy," she said sarcastically. "You're going to be hurting in the morning if you sleep sitting up like that. You can have half of the bed."

"NO WAY IN HELL," he whisper screeched. The skin on his neck and ears blazed in embarrassment; luckily, the dark room didn't make it obvious.

Jude rolled her eyes at the boy and sleepily grumbled," Don't make it weird, Dude. This bed is massive."

She plopped a pillow in between her and the opposite side of the mattress. "You stick to your side of the bed and I'll stick to mine."

Now keep in mind, Jude wouldn't just invite someone she barely knew to sleep in her bed under normal circumstances. However, her judgment was always a little cloudy if she was half asleep, and her innate sense of empathy usually took over during these type of scenarios. The red paladin had an obvious crick in his neck and his back had to be sore from sleeping upright. Naturally, the polite thing to do would be to offer him half of the bed. Or that's how delirious Jude logic tended to work, anyway.

The part of Keith's brain that was awake tried to fight the temptation of taking the girl up on her offer, but the half asleep side of his brain decided to cave in. He was exhausted by the whole stabbing incident and just wanted to sleep it off. As a result, the red paladin begrudgingly flopped onto the bed.

Jude's eyes were closed, but she sleepily grumbled," Take your shoes off, Weirdo."

"You were giving me much nicer nicknames earlier," He scoffed. However, he still did as he was told and kicked off his boots.

"I was trying to keep you calm," she yawned. "I thought you were going to pass out."

"Still, you gave me four nicknames in the course of fifteen seconds. What was with all of that "sweetie" stuff anyway?"

"I don't know, I was just trying to be encouraging," she said lazily. "You were all freaked out."

"Was not," he argued as Jude passed him the covers.

"Whatever you say," she yawned. She burrowed deeply into the sheets, signaling the end of the conversation. It turns out that getting stabbed can really wipe a person out, and Jude elected to sleep off the initial shock that came with almost being impaled.

However, Keith's strong suit didn't lie in picking up on social cues. Instead, he continued to drag out the conversation.

"Why were you even up, anyway? Everyone thought you had gone to bed."

"I don't know, Keith," she sighed. "I was thirsty. And what about you? Do you always carry a gigantic sword everywhere you go?"

"I just got done with combat training," he argued back. "And then there was that big thud in the kitchen, I thought someone had broken into the castle."

"Dude, I'm like five feet tall, but apparently Alteans are built like Harlem Globetrotters. I have to climb on stuff if I want to reach anything on this freaking ship. I don't stick graceful landings when I jump off countertops," she huffed.

"Yeah, but why did you want the weird sleep tea?"

"I just like the flavor," Jude said quietly. Her dream briefly flashed through her mind, resulting in a small involuntary twitch. The room was dark, so Jude figured that the red paladin wouldn't have noticed.

However, the boy continued to press her with more questions.

"Is it because you got another nightmare?"

Jude paused for a second before blurting out an unconvincing," No."

The red paladin didn't buy it.

"Tell the truth," he said sleepily.

"Everyone gets nightmares," she whispered. This time she was more determined to shut down the conversation and reached over to cover his mouth with her small hand. "Just go to sleep."

He mumbled something into the palm of her hand, but Jude wasn't having it.

"Shhh shhh shhh nope," she hushed. "Go to sleep."

The boy kept trying to talk against his better judgement, and Jude opened her droopy eyes.

"Keith, sweetie," she mumbled. "I know I owe you my life and I'm eternally grateful that you snatched me out of space prison, but I will try my damndest to zap you if you don't go to sleep."

For a second, his eyes bugged out and his mumbling was silenced. Jude smiled at the result and moved her hand away from his mouth.

"Good night," she babbled contentedly.

"Good night, Jude," he grumbled.

Jude's eyelids promptly fell and a few curls snuck up to frame her face. Her lips parted slightly as her jaw relaxed, although her eyebrows were slightly furled due to the dull ache where the wound had been a few hours earlier. Jude shifted a little in her state of pre-sleep, tucking her knees into her chest as she wrapped her arms around the pillow that guarded her respective side of the bed. Keith caught himself gazing at her relaxed figure for a little too long and immediately flipped onto his back and stared at the ceiling as embarrassment clawed its way from his neck onto his cheeks. He decided it would be best to focus on the dim lights in the ceiling before he let his mind drift into sleep. Keith didn't dare look back at the sleeping girl at his side.

The next time his eyes opened, there was a dead weight on his arm and a full head of hair tickling his face.

"What the hell, Jude," he groaned.

"Don't you dare get mad at me," she grumbled. "You invaded my side of the bed."

The red paladin sat up in confusion and scowled at his surroundings in confusion. She was right. Jude's nose was pressed against the wall and the pillow that she used to separate them was flung onto the other side of the room. He had one leg slung over hers, but it took him a minute to actually process the predicament he was in before he scrambled away from her. In the process of retracting his arm, his glove snagged on her hair and ripped her neck backwards.

"SONOFABITCH," she yelped.

Keith's face turned beet red as he desperately tried to untangle himself from her wild locks. If at all possible, he only managed to make the situation worse.

"I'm trying to get it out," he growled. "How the hell do you have this much hair?!"

"Well _excuse_ me," she said sarcastically, and slightly congested-ly . "Fabio couldn't fit me in at the salon for a haircut."

"Can it," he seethed. His eyebrows furled as he tried to free himself, but the stuff was like quicksand. The harder Keith tried to free himself, the more of a knotted mess Jude's hair became. The girl grew impatient and sat up to slap his hands away.

"Quit squirming," she scolded. Doing her best to not rip a patch of hair out of her head, Jude sat up and began the extraction. She carefully unraveled her burly black locks from the fabric of his glove, not noticing the way he watched intently.

"It's beyond me how you managed to get stuck like this," she said with a yawn.

"I'm just talented like that," he said sarcastically.

Jude didn't pay him much attention. She was too focused on removing the boy from her head. With only one tangle stuck in between his fingers, she quickly cut him loose.

"There," she said, satisfied with her work. "You're free now, you freaking koala."

"Don't over-exaggerate the situation," he groaned.

"I wish I was," she said nasally. "But you stole all of the blankets and had me pinned to the wall for god-knows-how-long." Jude stretched out and attempted to twist her locks into a braid in her half-asleep stupor. She swallowed hard, but a sharp lump in her throat prevented the thick sludge in her mouth from going down. She grabbed the front of her throat with a frown before speaking again.

"But I'm not going to subject you to my dragon breath," she croaked. "I'm gonna go get a drink."

Jude tried to crawl out of the bed, but her movements were slurred as she moved towards the edge. Keith noticed how sluggishly she approached the foot of the bed. When she swung her legs over and tried to stand, the room began to spin.

"You okay, Jude," Keith asked.

She nodded and slurped back a stream of boogers.

"I just need a sec," she lied.

Jude stuck her hands out to stabilize the room before sitting down at the edge of the bed again. The girl didn't even think to question where her strange new pajamas had come from or when she had changed out of her previous outfit. She was obviously sick after putting her body through so much after the past couple of days, not to mention being put in the cryopods twice in the span of twenty four hours. Jude's refusal to slow down and recuperate upon her liberation was finally catching up with the in the form of achy bones and a sore throat.

"No, you need to stay in bed," Keith retorted.

She waved him off before saying," I'm fine. I just stood up too fast."

A wet cough full of mucous and despair erupted from her chest, completely delegitimizing her ruse. The red paladin shook his head at her and pointed at the spot that she had previously slept in.

"Bed, now," he said firmly.

"In a second," she argued weakly. "I'm gonna grab a drink from the kitchen first."

"I'll go get you a juice or something," he said exasperatedly. "Just, stay here and don't move."

Before Jude could argue, Keith sprang out of the covers and walked out of the room. She could've sworn that she heard him grumble something along the lines of "..stubborn" and "exhausting.." under his breath, but she couldn't say for sure.

When Keith had entered the canteen, several pairs of eyes were burning holes through him. The entire gang was there. the Garrison trio looked amused by the information that they had no doubt been given minutes before. The adults just looked plain exhausted. Lance had the biggest shit-eating grin in the room, immediately causing the red paladin to scowl.

"Soooooooooo, how was your night," he queried.

"Shut up," Keith growled. He grabbed a juice pack from the fridge.

"I heard you really rolled out the welcome stabbin- oops, I meant wagon."

"Lance, buddy. I love you, but that was in poor taste," Hunk said. "Somebody could've gotten seriously hurt."

"But she didn't," Keith said.

"Let's just be thankful that Keith and Jude were able to handle the situation calmly," Coran chimed in. "It took a lot of quick thinking to keep her from losing too much blood."

The red headed man gave Keith a nod and a quick thumbs up. No matter how badly someone messed up, the team could always count on Coran to be encouraging despite the circumstances.

"I just don't get how she's so ridiculously calm all of the time," Pidge sighed. "After getting thrown into a battle against the Galra and getting skewered, she's barely batted an eyelash."

"I didn't skewer her," Keith defended. "It was a flesh wound." The red paladin wore a mask made of stone as far as the other paladins were concerned, but his brain was on overdrive. Intense guilt had him in his clutches, but the fact that he had been tangled in in a stranger's bed all night was lingering in the back of his mind. He couldn't let the others know about his little conundrum, of course.

"Well, if it wasn't that bad, how come Jude didn't come down for breakfast," Lance asked.

"She went into the cryochamber twice yesterday," Allura added. "She's probably not feeling well."

Keith nodded. "I think that she's just got a sore throat and a runny nose. I told her to stay in bed, but who knows if she'll actually listen to me."

"Did you happen to check her temperature," Shiro asked.

"No, I just thought some fluids would fix everything." The group exchanged a few worried glances. They knew that Keith was coming from a good place, but he had only ever had to worry about his own well being. Nobody ever really coddled him whenever he got sick growing up, so he wasn't necessarily apt to coddle Jude.

"I'm gonna run this to her room. I'll see you guys around," He said. When he walked out of the room, everyone decided to get busy.

"I'll get the thermometer," Pidge volunteered.

"I'll put on a kettle," Coran added.

A few minutes later, everyone was crammed into Jude's bedroom. The girl was so disoriented that she wasn't quite positive who was sticking the thermometer in her mouth or who had pressed the cool cloth to her forehead. All she knew was that she her chest, throat, and nose were conspiring against her; and she was absolutely freezing.

"102.4," Shiro read. Then he took the thermometer out from between Jude's chapped lips. "It looks like you're out of commission today."

She groaned from under her thin blanket.

"Guys, I appreciate the concern, but I'm fine." Then the wettest, most painful cough ripped through her chest. Everyone in the room winced at the sound, but she didn't pay them any mind. "I'll just rub the space equivalent of Vicks on my chest and call it a day."

"Jude, you're shaking and humans probably aren't supposed to make that sound," Allura said firmly. "You haven't taken proper care of yourself from the moment you stepped onto this castle ship and you need to stay in bed."

It was true. She had barely eaten anything or slept in the last two days. Even now, Jude was sitting straight up with the headboard supporting her back. Her head dropped occasionally as the princess lectured her, but she was determined to look composed and in charge of her failing bodily functions.

"You should try to relax a bit," Hunk coaxed. "Like, I don't know. Lie down at least?"

She slowly slid down the headboard, but only a little. She couldn't argue with a nice guy like Hunk, she would feel too bad.

"You don't need to be on high alert, Jude," Shiro said. "We're too far away for the Galra to track our position, so we don't have to worry about another attack for awhile."

"Are you absolutely positive," she asked with a shiver.

"Positive," Shiro confirmed. "We're way on the outskirts of the empire. No one will bother us out here."

"In the meantime, you need to fight this illness with some fluids and nutrients," Coran said enthusiastically. He was holding a big steaming cup of god knows what, and carefully put it in Jude's hands. "This is a wonderful Altean beverage that was drunk by many generations of warriors."

"Wow, that's cool," she said. She looked at the strange liquid before asking, "What's it called?"

"Nunvil," he chirped. The entire team jumped towards her in an attempt to knock the cup out of her hands with a thundering of "NO"s, but it was too late. The girl had taken a healthy gulp in all of the confusion, and regret hit her like a ton of bricks. Her face twisted in pure agony as the liquid sloshed in her mouth. It tasted like the combination of pureed liver, beets, and a sweaty armpit; but she forced the liquid down anyway. To make matters worse, it burned like whiskey as it slowly slid down her chest like a thick syrup. The taste continued to linger in her mouth as she voiced her concerns.

"Lord in heaven above, that is FOUL," she yelled. "What gives, Coran?! The last time you gave me a suspicious liquid, it tasted like candy! I think that this stuff just shaved ten years off of my life."

"How strange," Coran mused. "All of the other paladins had a similar reaction. I have come to find that Earthlings have the strangest flavor pallette."

"I just can't believe that you actually swallowed it," Lance said in awe. "All of us spat that stuff out the first time Coran had us try it."

"Note to self; don't _ever_ mess with Jude," Pidge whispered to Shiro. "If she can drink Nunvil, she definitely has the capability to fuck your shit up."

"LANGUAGE," the leader shouted. "And you guys are over exaggerating a little, it's not that bad."

However it was, in fact, that bad. Everyone knew it, but Shiro did his best to be respectful of Altean culture and preserve Coran's feelings whenever the paladins started bashing on his kitchen skills. He didn't intend for Jude to take his comment seriously, though.

"Ugh, do you wanna polish it off, Shiro," Jude said as she extended the cup out to him. "I don't think I can finish it."

"Not for all of the money in the universe," he said quickly. Even if he did want to preserve Coran's feelings, he didn't actually want to _drink_ it.

Amongst all of the chatter, Keith took the cup from Jude's hands and replaced it with a juice pouch. She gave him a thankful smile before washing the taste of nunvil out of her mouth; and for a split second, his facial expression softened and it felt like something knocked against his chest. His face went straight back to stone at the new prospect that something was moving inside of him that shouldn't have been, probably space worms. Keith resolved to leave the room in favour of dumping out the Nunvil and getting on with his day. He still had a new level to beat on the gladiator, afterall.

She watched sleepily as he left the room. Disappointment crept into her chest when she remembered the look on his face. Jude decided that he probably didn't like her very much. Shiro and Allura had undoubtedly put him up to keeping an eye on her last night after the whole stabbing incident, and it probably wasn't comfortable to be stuck in her room all night.

Jude suddenly remembered the details of their little misadventure. Until now, she had completely forgotten that Delirious Jude offered him half of the bed and that Keith had actually _agreed_. And 'Oh god, was that boy grabby!'. Had he actually spooned her? Did she not have the common sense to push him off of her?

Embarrassment bloomed across her face as she processed the fact that she basically spent the night smushed up against the Red Power Ranger.

"I think the fever's getting worse. Her face is getting all red," Pidge observed.

"Maybe it's time for us to switch out this rag." Allura gingerly removed the little swatch of fabric from Jude's forehead before brushing her long fingers across the skin again. She frowned at the girl's temperature, which still felt a little too warm against the palm of her hand. "What else can we do for these type of Earth illnesses?"

"Guys, I appreciate the concern; but I know you're all probably busy. I don't want to eat up too much of your time, especially when I know that I'll probably just sleep most of the day." Another nasty cough filled up the room, and the princess frowned.

"Jude, we don't have the same kind of medicines that you have on Earth. We need to make sure that you're taken care of before it gets any worse," Allura said. "So if there's something you need, please tell us."

Jude looked around the room at everyone's concerned expressions and had no choice but to cave in. There was no use in worrying the team, so she threw them a bone.

"Well…" she she said thoughtfully. "Could I have an extra blanket?"

A big grin spread across the princess's face. At least they'd worn Jude down enough to make one small request, which was a start.

"I'll go grab one from my room," Lance offered. It was more or less of a well known fact that he had hoarded most of the castle's good blankets, so their new companion was about to get the hookup.

"Is there anything else you need," Coran asked. "I could put on another kettle!"

The room simultaneously yelled "NO!". Much like Shiro, Jude wanted to be respectful to Coran. He was going out of his way to make her a piping hot cup of ancient Altean pain juice after all.

"I think I'm fine," she declined politely. "Just the blanket is good for now!"

"In that case we should all let Jude get some rest," Shiro said to the group. "Just let us know if there's something you need."

Jude nodded and gave him a short "mm-hmm".

The group filed out of the room until there was only one paladin left: Pidge. Jude could see all of the wheels turning in her head as she was no doubt conjuring up some sort of brilliant scheme.

"What's up, Pidge," Jude said with a slurp of boogers.

"I got something that'll probably put you in a super good mood," she said with a wicked grin.

"Theraflu?," the patient said hopefully.

"Even better!" Jude hadn't noticed the big, clunky laptop that Pidge had been carrying the entire time until she had opened it. "I have a bunch of movies that I bootlegged back on Earth!"

The girl's face lit up like a Christmas tree as she squealed through a thick layer of throat mucus.

"You had me at bootlegged movies!"

Pidge flopped onto the messy bed and began typing away on her laptop. The images on the screen reflected comically across the green Paladin's glasses.

"What're you in the mood to watch," she asked. "I've got horror movies, superhero movies, antihero movies, comedies, Disn-"

"DISNEY MOVIES!" Jude squeaked. "Do you have Hercules?!"

"You bet your sweet ass I do," she said confidently. "The better question is what _don't_ I have?"

"You just made a big mistake," Jude chuckled. "I'm probably not gonna let you leave now that you told me that you have unlimited Disney movies."

"That's fine," she laughed. "It's going to be awhile before we land on Arus. I've got time to kill.

A few minutes later, the movie was playing on the wall thanks to a small projector that Pidge had rigged onto her laptop. The opening number for the Muses was wrapping up and the girls had done their best to make a nest out of the pillows on the bed. Jude was still achy as ever, but she was pretty content with the situation.

Three sharp knocks thrummed against the door.

"It's open," Jude called out the best she could.

Lance entered the room with an armful of blankets and a big grin. Jude's eyes lit up at the sight and outstretched her arms to him.

"Oh thank god," she sighed. "I'm freezing."

He proceeded to dump the pile of blankets on top of her before announcing that he was crashing the movie marathon.

"Alright ladies, make some room. I don't wanna get stuck polishing the pods again if Coran finds me." Then he moved onto the bed, squishing Pidge in the middle of the huddle and pinning Jude's shoulder to the wall again.

"C'mon dude," Pidge complained. "It's not a big bed; we _just_ got comfortable."

"Too late," Lance said. "Now shush, Hercules is about to chuck Pain and Panic off a mountain."

Despite the compact conditions, Jude was thrilled to have a bunch of blankets and do something normal for once. She was perfectly content to sit still for a little while. As characters moved across the screen, a comfortable sleepiness began to overtake her.

Two musical sequences later, the girl was out cold. Of course, the Lance and Pidge were to absorbed by the movie to even notice. However, there was a light knock on the door and before anyone could answer, Hunk shuffled in with a breakfast tray and frowned at his fellow Paladins.

"You guys couldn't have let her sleep in peace?"

Their heads immediately snapped, only to see Jude huddled against the wall in feverish sleep.

"Aww nuts," Lance said. "We should get out of here so she won't be so cramped."

"Or!" Pidge chimed in. "We can just turn on the bed extender so we all fit better."

"The what?"

Instead of answering, Pidge climbed over the blue paladin and began searching for something on the outer rim of the bed. When her fingers met a switch on the frame, she eagerly flipped it and the bed started to rumble. The mattress slowly expanded outward and the boys looked at the bed in disbelief.

"Do all of our beds do this," Hunk shrieked. "I've been sleeping on a twin this entire time!"

Hunk shook his head violently at his momentary lapse in judgement and addressed the real problem. Sleeping arrangements were beside the point. Now there were four people crammed inside of a one-person bedroom, and they weren't doing Jude any favors by crowding her.

"Even if the bed extends, we should still let her rest without the projector blaring."

"Lighten up," Pidge whined. "If we leave now, Allura's going to find us and make us train all day. Do you really want to get pummeled by the gladiator bot on your day off?"

"Well," the yellow paladin began to cave. "I guess that we won't get another day off for awhile…"

"Get in on this blanket nest action, buddy," Lance said as he chucked a fluffy blanket at his friend.

Hunk begrudgingly pulled up a chair and sat down to watch the movie. Did he know that weaseling out of training wasn't the honorable thing to do? Yes. Did he know that cramming four people into a single bedroom would get a little crowded? Yes. Did he care enough to spar with the gladiator bot? Absolutely not.

As long as he was hiding from training, he might as well get comfortable. This meant that he would eventually prop his feet up on Lance's legs.

By the time that the credits were rolling, the Garrison trio were already debating which movie they would watch next.

"For the last time, Lance," Pidge huffed. "We're not watching Tangled again."

"But Eugene is the ultimate anti-hero," the blue paladin whined.

"No, Wade Wilson is the ultimate anti-hero," she corrected. "And we left Earth before Deadpool hit the release date, so we can't watch that one either."

"C'mon guys," Hunk said. "Can't we just make a compromise?"

At that exact moment, the door slid open and the black paladin loomed over the walkway. By the way his arms were crossed over his massive chest, it was obvious that he was not pleased to see the three teenagers slacking off. They simultaneously shrank back into their blankets and tried to avoid their leaders gaze as a result of his icy glare.

"Is this where you guys have been this entire time," he said with a hint of disappointment.

"More or less," Hunk said innocently.

"Jude was really excited to have a movie marathon while she was awake," Pidge chuckled nervously.

"And you didn't think it might be a good idea to move this marathon to the common room after she fell asleep?"

"Well…" Lance said. However, he didn't have a good argument. Silence was their best option at this point.

Shiro pinched the bridge of his nose and let out an exasperated sigh.

"Did any of you check her temperature?"

Pidge quickly slid her arm out from beneath the covers and laid the back of her hand on the girl's forehead. Jude shuddered at the sudden contact and mumbled incoherently in her sleep. The green paladin frowned.

"She still feels really warm," she said.

Jude rolled over and pried her eyes open. She was a little surprised to see four out of five of Voltron's body parts hanging out in her room.

"Hi, guys," she said with a raspy voice. "Are we having a party?"

"We were just going to let you get some rest," Shiro said pleasantly, like he wasn't just scolding the others.

"You guys don't have to," Jude said nervously. "I-I like the company."

Maybe it was just the slight delirium that comes with a bad fever, but Jude didn't want to take her chances. Sure, she was only sleeping in increments of a couple of hours at a time; but she didn't have nightmares whenever there was someone else in the room. Even when the Garrison trio was arguing, she had slept soundly. She hadn't dreamt about anything at all. And when Keith had been in the room, Jude had felt safe and secure; even in that uneasy dream world it didn't feel like anything bad could touch her. If they left now, she was sure that the nightmares would swallow her up the second she closed her eyes.

The panic must've been written all over her face, because Shiro could see it. Maybe he didn't know exactly why she looked so scared, but he could narrow it down to a few reasons. He knew what it felt like to be constantly looking over his shoulder and expecting the worst. Having good people around could be comforting in times like these.

"Alright," he surrendered. "I guess that it couldn't hurt to watch one more movie."

Then he plopped down on the floor at the foot of the bed. The black paladin stretched out and leaned against the footboard before casting his vote.

"And the Iron Giant is a classic, so let's watch that."

The group shared happy glances at each other as Pidge loaded another movie. Jude let out a shaky breath in relief as she relaxed into the pillow. She had a game plan now. She just had to be in the same room as another person whenever she needed to sleep. She could take a couple of power naps throughout the day without a problem.

Before Jude could work out any of the finer details in her plan, her eyes began to fall shut again. She smiled a little at the sight of everyone having a good, stress free time and wondered how long it would last. Just as long as there were people in the room, she was going to catch up on some sleep.

When she woke up, however, the room was empty. Shiro had undoubtedly herded everyone out of the room after the movie had ended. Jude rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and stretched out her arms and legs. Pins and needles pricked the inside of her throat as she rose from the covers. Now that she didn't feel so woozy, Jude thought she would try walking to the kitchen for a glass of water.

After a solid ten minutes of aimless wandering, Jude had successfully found the kitchen. Beyond the door, she could hear a couple of voices going back and forth.

"Don't be so hard on yourself," Shiro coaxed. "It was an accident, and she's already recovering really well."

"Yeah, I guess," Keith said quietly.

"You can't avoid her forever. This castle is only so big, you'll run out of hiding places eventually."

"I'm not avoiding anyone," he defended. "I'm just using the day off to my advantage. Zarkon is still out there, and we can't afford to drop everything for this girl."

"I know that," the leader said reassuringly. "But the universe isn't going to collapse on itself if you take some time to rest after missions. Everyone on the team admires your dedication to your training, but you need to be careful not to overdo it."

Now felt like as good of a time as any to interrupt. Jude felt bad for eavesdropping on an obviously personal conversation, so she decided to make her presence known in the worst possible taste.

She raised her hands over her head and began speaking loudly," I come in peace! I'm walking into the kitchen, so please hide all sharp objects now!"

The black paladin chuckled a little at her surprisingly good attitude about the whole situation. Keith, however, rolled his eyes at the badly timed joke. She wasn't as bad as Lance, but she still managed to make him scowl. When Jude saw his expression, she coughed and quit hamming it up. Instead of lingering in the awkwardness that she had caused, Jude promptly filled a cup at the sink and avoided making too much eye-contact as she hoisted herself onto the counter. She downed half of the liquid hastily to soothe her aching throat.

"I see that you're starting to feel better," Shiro smiled. Truth be told, she still felt like she had been hit by a truck; but Keith was right. She couldn't expect the team to keep fussing over her as long as there was so much work to be done. Jude decided that as long as she could keep her head up she would work just as hard as the rest of the team.

"Yeah," she chirped. "I bounce back pretty fast."

"That's good to hear, since we'll be landing on Arus in a few hours. Are you going to feel up to getting off the ship for a little bit and help us relocate the refugees?"

"Of course," she said eagerly. "I want to say goodbye to everyone and make sure that they'll be okay. All of us are going to be excited to land on solid ground." Shiro knew the feeling all too well. After the team had found him on Earth, the first thing he did was sit on the ground outside of Keith's shack for a few minutes. It wasn't the homecoming that he had imagined, but he was grateful for the little time that he had back then.

"In that case, you should get some rest before we land," he said.

"But I haven't done anything but sleep since I got here," she whined. "Isn't there something I can help with, like I don't know, like polishing boots or hosing off the ships or something?" Shiro was slightly taken aback. It was like pulling teeth to get the paladins to train or do chores around the castle, and Jude was _eager_ to do the grunt work.

"Take it easy, Jude. This isn't boot camp, so we're not going to make you clean the bathrooms with a toothbrush or anything."

The black paladin spoke too soon however. Allura and Coran rounded the corner, surprised to see the girl up and about already; but they didn't skip a beat.

"Jude, it's so good to see you doing so well so soon!" Coran looked relieved to see her without a gash in her side.

"Yes! Now that you're up, we have some time to give you a crash course training session,"Allura exclaimed. The girl nearly spat out her water.

"Crash course training?"

No doubt, she was ready to pull her weight on the ship; but she was not prepared for full blown training. Jude was planning on blending into the framework and just doing the menial tasks that nobody else wanted to do, because that's all she knew _how_ to do. She didn't know anything about combat or piloting, and she had no idea how to go about using her Galra modification.

"Oh Allura I-" But Jude was cut off by an overly-enthusiastic princess ripping her arm out of the socket.

"There's no time to waste; let's go!"


End file.
